Open Wheeler

Franchitti Wins at Long Beach

2009-04-19T17:59:00.031-05:00

Welcome to Long Beach, one of the greatest street car races in the world.

The VERSUS team gets right to it with the story of Helio’s court case

(Thanks: WFOR-TV)

He was welcomed back with open arms in the pits.

And then there was the mistakes of Helio was he tried to get used to his car and team again.

His hit during qualifying hurt resulting in a headache.

But Helio’s troubles including the headache are gone and he is ready to race.

Over to Grahm Rahal, “We want to do well for them.” (Paul Newman’s friends and family) Long Beach was one of Newman’s favorite tracks.

Paul Tracy is back for the Indianapolis 500 and presumably Edmonthon and Toronto.

Yes that is the GEICO geko with Max Pappis inder the head. “I am going back to the Indy 500 with hopes of coming back to the series.” According to PT, a win at Indy should equate to his return to the series.

Kick the tires and light the fire, Will Power is one the pole but didn’t immediate roll off with the grid. No worries, he is off and rolling.

We are green!

Unlike last weekend there are now circus antics lake last weekend at St. Pete. In fact there were no incidents on the first lap. Mr. Barnhardt’s lecture must have been effective.

Lap 14 and Mike Conway meets the tire barrier.

Soon after leader Will Power slows and in the backup ScottDixon and EJ Viso touch and Viso goes airborne.

Now to lap 23 and we have a big mess.

Bring in the clowns.

Dan Weldon, Darren Manning, Mario Moraes, Hideki Mutoh and Junsin Wilson were involved in the traffic jam.

Stanton Barrett goes off course bringing out a local yellow.

Later, Ed Carpenter noses into turn one.

Mike Conway looses it and puts it into the wall.

Now under caution, Graham Rahal goes to leave the pits and the fuel hose is attached.

It looks bad and could have been much worse but thankfully VERSUS did not report any injuries.

Mario Moraes hits the rumble strips and buries himself deeeep in the tire barrier.

Ed Carpenter got a little off and pulled up besides Moraes but all was good.

Under caution, Ryan Briscoe gets into the back of Scott Dixon coming out of the hairpin spinning him around and damaging Briscoe’s car.

Briscoe is called to pit lane for a penalty as a result of the hit under caution.

In the final laps, March Andretti gets into Dan Weldon in the hairpin but both continue.

As Vitor Meira gets into the tires on the final lap,

Dario Franchitti takes his first win since returning to the series as his wife celebrates.

The win is Franchitti’s 9th in the series and comes on his wife’s (Ashley Judd) birthday.

IndyCar Series Long Beach Finish
Dario Franchitti
Will Power
Tony Kanaan
Danica Patrick
Dan Weldon
Marco Andretti
Helio Castroneves
Raphael Matos
Robert Doornbos
Alex Tagliani
Ryan Hunter-Reay
Graham Rahal
Ryan Briscoe
Vitor Meira
Scott Dixon
Darren Manning
Stanton Barrett
Ed Carpenter
Mario Moraes
Hideki Mutoh
Mike Conway
Justin Wilson
EJ Viso

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of IMS Productions and VERSUS.

Ryan Briscoe Wins IndyCar Opener/ Carl Edwards Wins WWE Championship

2009-04-05T21:54:00.038-05:00

Ryan Briscoe Wins IndyCar Opener

Welcome to the IndyCar Series opener at St. Pete.

Green flag and the IRL takes a page out of

Champ Car and a cluster evolves.

Tony Kanaan gets into pole sitter Graham Rahal.

Other cars go spinning.

On the replay we see Alex Tagliani

going “Dukes of Hazard” over Graham Rahal’s nose.

This accident isn’t anyone’s fault in particular, it was just the whole field going for the same spot.

Mike Conway who appears to get the worst of it.

Rahal and Kanaan come in for new front wings. Green again and this time the single file start is clean. We go to commercial break and all heck breaks loose.

Raphael Matos gets a run on Danica Patrick but does not get beside her

and takes her out

in a turn that was not the best for passing.

The result is an extremely HARD slide into the wall that had to hurt. The hit was so hard it moved the temporary wall.

After the incident, the two drivers got out of their cars to discuss the incident.

Talking about Matos’ move, Danica Patrick told VERSUS’ Jack Arute, “It was a brave maneuver that did not make it.”

About the same time that the Danica Patrick and Matos spin-o-rama was occurring,

Hideki Mutoh gets into Mario Moraes

and he goes spinning.

And Vitor Meira got into Alex Tagliani cutting Atag’s tire.

Will Power makes a mistake and misses his pits which kills the pit stop of Scott Dixon. The result, a horrid pits top by Dixon whose team has to slowly slide back his car to even get close to the fuel nozzle.

Lap 55 and Stanton Barrett brings out a full course caution for a stall.

Lap 81 now and Scott Dixon gets into Hideki Mutoh and breaks something in this left front suspension.

The next turn and Dixon is into the wall as a result of the suspension.

Robert Doornbos gets into Dan Weldon and Hideki Mutoh and Marco Andretti all get collected.

In the mayhem Ryan Hunter-Reay gets by for second place on this corner.

Alex Tagliani slides to the inside and takes out Marco Andretti.

Green with three laps to go. Ryan Briscoe gasses it and holds off Ryan Hunter-Reay for the win.

After the race, team owner Roger Penske told VERSUS, “This one is for Helio.”

IndyCar Series St. Petersburg Finish

Ryan Briscoe
Ryan Hunter-Reay
Justin Wilson
Dario Franchitti
Tony Kanaan
Will Power
Graham Rahal
Darren Manning
Vitor Meira
Alex Tagliani
Robert Doornbos
Stanton Barrett
Marco Andretti
Dan Weldon
Hideki Mutoh
Scott Dixon
EJ Viso
Ed Carpenter
Danica Patrick
Raphael Matos
Mario Moraes
Mike Conway

Carl Edwards wins the WWE Championship (Not Really)
(No stills due to restrictions)
When John Cena won the WWE World Championship belt tonight, he headed out in the crowd to pose with Open Wheeler Carl Edwards and his Roush PR dude Randy Fuller. Nice!

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of IMS Productions and VERSUS.

Wind Tunnel Recap

2009-03-09T19:29:00.011-05:00

Free Helio!

The website IsItMayYet.com is providing pretty good coverage of Helio Castroneves’ trial. That is where this log comes from. I hope that Helio is not guilty and if he is not, I hope he can return to racing soon. He is one of the best and nicest drivers on the circuit.

Robin Miller Talks Trial

A sick (with the flu) Robin Miller appeared on Wind Tunnel Sunday night via phone to talk about Helio Castroneves’ trial.

Miller reported that Castroneves’ attorney believe the government is going aster his client because he is a celebrity.

Dave Despain then noted that it was interesting that several high profile politicians recently got into tax trouble but they have not been hauled into federal court.

The point was also made about the timing of the trial.

Eye Candy = Fun

The interview was followed by Eye Candy which did not disappoint.

This explains why we don’t have sign girls in the IRL.

The crew members aren’t looking at their bikes.

The folks at Wind Tunnel joined web surfers at SpeedTV.com for a post WT chat.

Steve Letarte is the featured guest next week.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of IsItMayYet.com and SPEED

Atlanta Wrap

2009-03-08T20:21:00.018-05:00

NASCAR Raceday Celebrates 100 Races at the ATL

The 100th race anniversary of Atlanta Motor Speedway was not lost on the NASCAR Raceday crew who opened the show with a special montage from the archives.

The show then shifted to the differences between Las Vegas and Atlanta. A well produced piece by Hermie Saddler.

Wendy Venturini then interviewed the race favorite, Kyle Busch. Sadler then jetted off to talk to Kasey Kahne about his performance so far this season.

About 30 minutes into the show, a great package of the AMS airs complete with historical footage of the greatest Motorsports reporter ever, Chris Economaki reporting for ABC’s Wide World of Sports.

Digger Makes Fun of F1

Ok, now over to the FOX coverage. Oh look, there is the weekly Digger cartoon. This week Digger’s relative who is French and races in F1 (where have I heard this before Ricky Bobby)? Digger and the F1 driver trade barbs like this one.

“But you NASCAR isn’t faster its so slow it makes me sick, Like ring around the rosy, it’s a joke for little kids.”

Nice work. Digger comes back but just says it’s better because it is better. Stereotypical NASCAR fan. Frenchy hits a tree and looses the race. Typical F1, hey wait, how did a tree become part of the racetrack of a cookie cutter oval?

Never mind. Before we green flag the marathon of unbridled speed, here is my pick for commercial of the race. Looks it’s a talking fish asking for some of him back.

“What if it were you hanging on this wall? If it were you in that fish sandwich you wouldn’t be laughing at all!”

That makes about as much sense as an NASCAR gopher racing and F1Gopher.

Big Brother Wins in the ATL

Carl Edwards says he will be looking for a cushion today with a hot slick race track. Look for the Open Wheelers to do well. Ok, lets light this candle. Mark Martin leads them to the green. A few laps into the race and Reed Sorenson sides into the wall with our first caution.

Ten laps Later Bobby Labonte spins. To lap 104 now and it looks like Labonte’s car is not handling any better as he hits the wall.

Lap 205 now and Sam Hornish hits the wall and then hits Bill Elliott. (Please come back to the IRL Sam!) Lap 217 and the pole setter Mark Martin wrecks after something went south on his car.

62 laps to go and coming off of a restart for debris, Scott Speed gets up into David Ragan.

David Stremme then hits Greg Biffle and Biffle hits the wall hard. The accident knocked Scott Speed out of the top 35 in points.

One late caution for debris thanks to a Robby Gordon tire. Time for final pits stops. Carl Edwards wins the race off of pit road with a two tire stop. Kurt Busch came off of pit road 2nd. On the restart with two laps to go, Busch takes the high line and Edwards the low. Kurt Busch rockets to the lead and Gordon follows getting by Edwards who would finish 3rd as Kurt Busch wins one for Roger Penske.

Busch then celebrates by driving around the track with the checkered flag backwards.

Atlanta Cup Open Wheelers Finish
1. Kurt Busch
2. Jeff Gordon
3. Carl Edwards
7. Kasey Kahne
8. Tony Stewart
16. Casey Mears
17. A J Allmendinger
22. Ryan Newman
26. Robbie Gordon
27. Juan Pablo Montoya
29. John Andretti
35. Scott Speed
37. Sam Hornish Jr.
41. Dave Blaney
43. Mike Bliss

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of SPEED, ABC, FOX and NASCAR Images.

OMG, He Said the P Word

2009-03-02T19:31:00.005-06:00

OMG, He Said the P Word

(File)
I was watching the Sunday March 1 delayed edition of Wind Tunnel. While waiting to hear from Graham Rahall and Stanton Barrett I heard something that I would not have said in front of my mother… the P word. What?? Did he just say what I though he said? The P word? Yep he did, not only once but twice.

(File)
After several not so intelligent callers, Dave Despain quoted an email saying, “NASCAR fixes the races, Jimmie Johnson is a P word and Kyle Busch is a jerk and NASCAR wants them to lead every lap.” Despain continued asking the question, “how is it in NASCAR’s interest to have a P word and a jerk lead all of the laps? I don’t get that.”

(File)
In his defense:
1. Dave had gone through a long line of not so intelligent callers.
2. The first time he said the P word he was quoting from an email.
3. The program is TVNR which means not rated, watch at your own caution.
4. While you are not to use the P word on broadcast TV (unless you are referring to a cat), you can say it on cable.

(File)
Hey it is cable so they can say what ever they want. I am not about to act all holier that thou saying that he is a bad guy and I have never said that word. I am not proud of it but I have used that word before. My point is I try to keep my language at a certain standard when in the presence of children or my mother and would expect the same of my favorite television shows whether they are over the air or not. I would like to be able to watch Wind Tunnel with my niece and not have to explain to her what a P word is.

Did Dave lose me as a viewer? Do I think that they should restrict what DD says? Nope. But to quote Jim Carr (from Slap Shot), “I think we should keep the comments within the boundaries of good taste.”

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of SPEED.

The Crash

2009-02-27T07:56:00.003-06:00

The Crash

Like racing, even the best racecars and drivers can be sidelined because of a crash. Well last night the computer at the World Headquarters of Open Wheeler crashed hard. The computer housed several stories that were written for this weekend and the software to provide you with new screen grabs.

We are working to remedy the problem and hope to have it resolved by next week. Until then, we will continue to provide updates from the computer we use for remote updates. Thanks again for visiting.

Images in this blog are courtesy of FX and NASCAR Images.

Welcome to TV Thursday/ It Was Boring but It Had a Good Number/ Bring a Freaking Towel/ Sked

2009-02-25T20:20:00.010-06:00

Welcome to TV Thursday
Where we deal with TV news regarding racing. I was hoping to save the USAC/ Versus news for today but I had to let the cat out of the bag one day early. Read that story below.

It Was Boring but It Had a Good Number

Autoclub 500 at Auto Club Speedway on Sunday evening was probably one of the most boring Cup races I have watched in some time.

Irregardless what I think it was still the highest rated sporting event on TV for the week drawing a 6.0/10 national household rating/share according to Nielsen Media Research and FOX PR.

That’s 10.2 million viewers.

Even though it drew good numbers which were better than previous years, it was up against the Academy Awards on ABC.

That show averaged a 20.6. Still, folks are watching.

This Weekend on Wind Tunnel

Dave Despain will have NHRA Funny Car Points Leader Ron Capps as their featured guest this Sunday at 9pm eastern on SPEED.

Bring a Freaking Towel

For many years drivers and crews have sprayed liquids in Victory Lane.

Note to camera folks who go to victory lane. Bring a towel.

Your vest/ credential will not cut it. I am sure “G” would love to give you a towel to use in “G” victory lane. Not bringing a towel is kind of like forgetting to bring a battery for your camera in Victory Lane.

A wet lens is bound to happen but preparation will overcome a damp situation.

TV Schedule
February 28
12:00 pm NNS Qualifying SPEED

4:00 pm NNS Countdown ESPN2

4:30 pm NNS: Sam's Town 300 ESPN2

March 1
2:00 pm NASCAR RaceDay SPEED

3:30 pm NSCS Pre-Race Show FOX

4:30 pm NSCS: Shelby 427 at Las Vegas 7:00 pm SPEED Report SPEED

9:30 pm Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain SPEED

Coming Later this Week
An Open Wheel revival.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of SPEED, FOX and NASCAR Images.

Welcome to Web Wednesday/ USAC Opener at Manzanita on Versus/ USAC TV Q&A

2009-02-24T21:25:00.018-06:00

Welcome to Web Wednesday

We are starting a new feature today on Open Wheeler. Were calling it Web Wednesday. Every week we will highlight a great website for racing information. This week we are featuring USACRacing.com. Last year USAC unveiled a revamped website.

In addition to news and schedules, the new website features photos, live timing and scoring at select events and video. We will have more on USACRacing.com later in this blog.

USAC Opener at Manzanita on Versus

USAC will return to television in April as the Copper on Dirt airs on Versus. The network that brought four USAC sanctioned races to the airwaves will broadcast the opener at Manzanita on April 14 at a time to be announced. In 2008, Versus aired one Silver Crown and two USAC/CRA races. The network also broadcast the Turkey Night Grand Prix.

USAC TV Q &A

While it is exciting to have USAC back on TV, there was some grumbling among fans on message boards on several issues. I am going to attempt to give solutions to the points raised.

It is good to see USAC back on TV but why not more races and it is Versus?

I like most Open Wheel fans would like to see as many races as possible on TV but the reality is the golden days of Thursday Thunder on ESPN are over. Versus is not a widely watched channel but it is better than the Outdoors network. Open Wheel fans need to be extremely thankful to Lucus Oil, the production quality of the program is top notch and they put a lot of money into it.

What can we do to get more races on TV?

Park your butt in front of the TV when the race airs on Versus and write to the folks at the Lucus Oil and Versus to let then know how much you appreciate their coverage.

Grassroots Open Wheel Banished to the Internet?

Until grassroots Open Wheel racing draws remarkable numbers on TV, our favorite sport will be relegated to the internet. Maybe that is a good place for it to be.

Years ago folks theorized about putting USAC and WoO racing video live on the net.

The problem was that the high speed internet connections were not at every track to make that happen. In stepped the World of Outlaws Sprints with their new media trailer in 2006.

Besides a workspace, it had high speed internet via satellite. That bandwidth was good enough to send video.

Last season USAC began video feeds and while it is not as clean as watching a network race at home on TV, we are talking a one camera and one announcer real (plus webcast support)

without a 80 person TV crew and multiple pit reporters.

I have shot some racing and it takes a talent to find the action and be there before the wreck.
USAC is lucky to have the services of Dean Mills who loves the sport with all of his heart and has a knack for finding the highlight before it happens.

For that matter it is good to have Rob Klepper as the voice of USAC. A voice that knows everything about the drivers makes the race PA as well as the broadcast more enjoyable.

No it is not the glory days of ESPN and TNN for grass roots Open Wheel but you still get to see the race live and for free so stop complaining and start to use a word that my be new to your vocabulary when it comes to USAC… Thanks!

Coming Later this Week
TV Thursday and an Open Wheel revival.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of USACRacing.com and Open Wheeler.

JJ Yeley Tells Dave Despain What is Next For Him on Wind Tunnel

2009-02-22T22:42:00.008-06:00

JJ Yeley Tells Dave Despain What is Next For Him on Wind Tunnel

This week’s Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain featured Peter Windson talking F1 and a phone interview with JJ Yeley. Peter Windsor told Dave Despain that Ken Anderson and he are the primary partners in an US based F1 team.

Windsor went on to say that they are looking at American drivers to fill the cockpit although it is possible that they may bring in an experienced foreign driver.

A caller brought up the possibility of sending AJ Allmendinger to F1, Windsor said he would make a great driver bout would not confirm him as one of the two drivers that will be announced on Tuesday.

JJ Yeley said it is important for him to get into any race car that he can.

The USAC Triple Crown champ added that he is talking to teams in NASCAR.

Yeley said that he would love to get back into NASCAR.

JJ Yeley announced that he will be racing during USAC’s west coast swing including Las Vegas this coming weekend.

Coming Later this Week
USAC returns to television, Open Wheel racing on the internet, TV Thursday and an Open Wheel revival.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of SPEED.

Matt Kenseth Wins the Cup Race at California

2009-02-22T22:15:00.016-06:00

Matt Kenseth Wins the Cup Race at California
Matt Kenseth continued his winning ways Sunday night in California, winning the Cup race over Jeff Gordon.

We begin tonight’s coverage with notes from Raceday on SPEED. Look, its Wendy the pirate. Arg matey!

I have no idea why Wendy Venturini has the patch on but here are their picks. KW – 48, HS – 2, WV – 18, JS – 88 and JR – 99.

More interviews in the most complete prerace show in racing. Look, its Krista Voda doing her hair in the background.

Time for the FOX broadcast to start. FOX’s prerace show includes an interview with Dale Earnhardt Jr. who says “I take responsibility for this wreck,” referring to the mayhem he caused last week at Daytona.

FOX then throws to Krista Voda and Brian Vickers for the response. Vickers says, “I am ready to move on.”

Let's light this candle!

So on we will move to the green flag where Angie Harmon, the honorary starter either has a burning rubber fetish

or is high on adrenalin.

Green flag and time to take a nap.

Seriously, the only thing to note until late in the race is that they had several cautions for rain and

that Ryan Newman lost his transponder and then lost his endplate under one of the rain cautions.

The most exciting part of the first half was this kid who looks like he was tortured by his parents. Oh wait, he is a Jr. fan. Nevermind…

Ok FF to lap 72 where Mark Martin loses an engine. Lap 208 Kevin Harvick lost an engine and hit the wall hard. Dale Earnhardt Jr. also pulled in with engine problems. I am beginning to see a trend here. Now Aric Almirola looses an engine with 7 to go but he is out of harms way so we stay green.

Matt Kenseth is leading Jeff Gordon by the equal time until six to go when he turns the jets on, smoking the tires down low. A few laps later and it isn’t working as much now for Gordon as Kenseth is able to keep his distance.

Matt Kenseth wins two races in a row winning the Cup race at California.

This race went a little late tonight ending at 10pm eastern. Good thing I hit the DVR for Wind Tunnel. See separate blog story above for highlights.

Open Wheeler Cup Results California:
1. (Matt Kenseth)
2. Jeff Gordon
7. Carl Edwards
8. Tony Stewart
11. Juan Montoya
12. Kasey Kahne
23. Sam Hornish Jr.
24. Casey Mears
28. Ryan Newman
29. A.J. Allmendinger
30. Robby Gordon
31. John Andretti
41. Scott Speed
42. Dave Blaney

Coming Later this Week
USAC returns to television, Open Wheel racing on the internet, TV Thursday and an Open Wheel revival.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of FOX, SPEED and NASCAR Images.

Kaeding Wins the USAC Silver Crown Opener at Manzy/ Kyle Busch Makes History/ Michael McDowell Wreck and Fire

2009-02-22T00:52:00.019-06:00

Kaeding Wins the USAC Silver Crown Opener at Manzy

File image courtesy of USACRacing.com
Bud Kadeing won the USAC Silver Crown season opener tonight at Manzanita in Phoenix, Arizona. The California native battled Jesse Hockett all night up fron but made a late pass when it counted for the win. The runner up position was Hockett’s best finish in the Silver Crown Series. Levi Jones was third. Brad Sweet won the USAC Midget feature race. Darren Hagen took the USAC Sprint feature race.

USAC Silver Crown Manzanita Results
29 Bud Kaeding
199 Jesse Hockett
3 Levi Jones
22 Tracy Hines
6 Derek Hagar
37 Jon Stanbrough
32 AJ Fike
4 Josh Wise
27 Jerry Coons Jr.
21 Brian Tyler
50 Zack Daum
19 Kody Swanson
42 Mike Spencer
17 Shane Hmiel
96 Rickie Gaunt
26 Shane Cottle

Kyle Busch Makes History
Kyle Busch became the first driver in NASCAR history to win two major series races in the same day by winning both the Nationwide Series and the Camping World Truck Series at California today.

Welcome to California where it appears no one cares about NASCAR.

Yes folks the seats were empty for the truck race and they are empty again for the Nationwide race. The folks in LA abandoned the IRL race at the Fontana oval and now they have abandoned the support races for Cup. Well the folks still brought their campers.

Oh look, it’s Mickey and Minnie. How did they get into the broadcast? Oh, ESPN2 is owned by Disney or as Allen Bestwick put it, “It’s nice to see the boss and Mrs. Mouse.”

Ok, time to light this candle for the folks at home. Yawn, are we done yet?

Wait we have a caution with Michael McDowell.

The guy that barrel rolled his car at Texas has done blowed up and his car is on fire.

Actually oil is getting all over the headers causing this inferno.

Oil, engine parts and crap litter the track.

Michael McDowell looks for a safety crew. Luckily he escaped the fire with no injuries.

Then Open Wheeler Mike Bliss blows a tire.

Now the action is heating up. Greg Biffle gets into Brian Vickers and around he goes.

Biffle makes contact with Brad K

and as K spins, he collects Jason Leffler.

Lap 22 Milka, I mean Greg Biffle spins on his own and calls it a night.

Green flag now with 17 to go and Kyle Busch puts a bump and run on Carl Edwards and gets around him for the lead. Edwards meanwhile slips back several places. Meanwhile Busch tuens on the afterburners and no one can catch him. After the race Edwards told ESPN2 that the touch from Busch upset his car on the restart but it was just racing and added that Busch deserved to win because no one could touch him.

As noted above, Kyle Busch became the first driver in NASCAR history to win two major series races in the same day by winning both the Nationwide Series and the Camping World Truck Series at California today.

In both races, he drove away from his competition. He goes for the threepeat tomorrow and we will have post race coverage.

Here is where the Open Wheelers finished in the Nationwide Race at California:
1. (Kyle Busch)
4. Carl Edwards
11. Jason Leffler
13. Mike Bliss
14. Justin Allgaier
16. Michael Annett
37. Terry Cook

Coming Sunday
Coverage of our Open Wheelers on action in California plus Wind Tunnel notes.

Note to SpeedTV and Wendy Venturini fans, Raceday airs at 3:30pm eastern Sunday afternoon because of the late start of the Cup race. It will not air at it's normal time on Sunday morning.

Another quick Speed note: Wind Tunnel Sunday night will feature SPEED’s Peter Windsor who will talk about this year’s F1 season as well as preview his big F1 announcement which will be made next Tuesday LIVE on SPEED. (Hint, hint US based F1 team with US driver). Miguel Duhamel will talk motorcycle racing as Daytona Bike Week approaches.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of USACRacing.com, ESPN2 and NASCAR Images.

Busch Wins Truck Race at California

2009-02-21T16:30:00.008-06:00

Busch Wins Truck Race at California
Kyle Busch won the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race today in California.

I wrote this headline at the halfway point in the race. Seriously, it was that boring. Anyway, on to what little highlights there were. The Race started with 36 trucks in the field. The green stayed out as this race was pretty quiet. So quiet that FOX started looking for other things to talk about.

Oh look, Billy Ray Cyrus is on Kyle Busch’s pit box. Boy has he changed.

Image courtesy of CMT.

Where did the days of the mullet go? Must have left him when he moved to California. Back to the race and look, a few drivers ran out of talent.

Brian Scott spun after being helped around and into the fence by Mike Skinner.

Then two rookies, Chase Austin and Tayler Malsam got together on pit road under caution.

Later, Terry Cook was dropping fluid bringing out the caution. Back to the quiet of the boring California track. No wonder they have trouble selling tickets there.

The final lap was a lot like the majority of the race with Kyle Busch dominating to take the win all alone.

Open Wheeler Truck Results at California
1. (Kyle Busch)
5. T.J. Bell
10. Max Papis
18. Mike Bliss
25. Terry Cook

Later this Weekend
Coverage tonight of our Open Wheelers on action both in Phoenix and California. Plus Cup and Wind Tunnel coverage on Sunday.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of CMT, CBS Cable, FOX, Speed and NASCAR Images.

Hockett Wins the Silver Crown Shootout

2009-02-21T01:08:00.004-06:00

Hockett Wins the Silver Crown Shootout

Jesse Hockett started on the pole and led all ten laps to win the Silver Crown portion of the Shootout Friday night at Manzanita Speedway in Phoenix, Arizona.

Hockett faced fierce competition from Bud Kaeding and Tracy Hines but was able to pull away for the win in the end.

Darren Hagen won the Sprint Shootout. Levi Jones won the Midget Shootout.

Silver Crown Shootout Results
199 Jesse Hockett
29 Bud Kaeding
22 Tracy Hines
3 Levi Jones
27 Jerry Coons Jr.
17 Shane Hmiel
37 Jon Stanbrough
32 AJ Fike
6 Derek Hagar

USAC will webcast the Copper World on Dirt Saturday night from their website USACRacing.com with live video, audio and timing and scoring. Information from tonight’s reports from Manzanita was taken from those webcasts.

The images in this post are courtesy of Dean Mills Video Productions and USACRacing.com and may not be used or lifted and posted on any other website.

Silver Crown Heat Race Results

2009-02-21T00:21:00.001-06:00

Levi Jones Wins First Heat Race
Zack Daum spun with one lap to go in the heat race resetting the field as Levi
Jones and Jerry Coons Jr. prepared to duke it out. The green flag dropped and Jones held off Coons for the win.

First Silver Crown Heat Race Results
3 Levi Jones
27 Jerry Coons Jr.
4 Josh Wise
37 Jon Stanbrough
29 Bud Kaeding
21 Brian Tyler
19 Kody Swanson
50 Zack Daum

Derek Hagar Wins Second Heat Race
Derek Hagar chased Shane Hmiel who sat on the pole and eventually got by the driver of the No. 27 on the outside. Jesse Hockett battled with Hmiel and got by him on lap 6. Meanwhile Derek Hagar pulled away to win.

Second Silver Crown Heat Race Results
6 Derek Hagar
199 Jesse Hockett
17 Shane Hmiel
22 Tracy Hines
32 AJ Fike
28 Shane Cottle
42 Mike Spencer
96 Rickie Gaunt

Jones Fastest in Qualifying

2009-02-20T21:08:00.004-06:00

Jones Fastest in Qualifying
Levi Jones was fastest in USAC Silver Crown qualifying tonight at the Copper World on Dirt. Jones turned a time of 20.270.

Tracy Hines had smoke pouring of his right rear on his way to turning a time good for second quick at 20.342 and

Bud Kaeding had a time of 20.389. Both Shane Hmiel and Cody Swanson went around during qualifying but there was no contact.

Chris Windom had the fastest times for the sprints with a time of 20.213.
Chat Boat had the fastest time of the midgets with a time of 19.954.

Heat races are up next live at USACRacing.com.

USAC Provides Live Racing on the Net
USACRacing.com is providing live video, a live announcer and live timing and scoring. In fact they are using the same video player that the Indy Racing League utilizes for it’s webcasts. Kudos to Rob Klepper, Dean Mills and the web team for a good program.

The images in this post are courtesy of Dean Mills Video Productions and USACRacing.com and may not be used or lifted and posted on any other website.

Manzy Coverage Live on USACRacing.com

2009-02-20T19:16:00.007-06:00

Manzy Coverage Live on USACRacing.com

USAC is webcasting live from the Copper World on Dirt tonight on USACRacing.com. The webcast has been great so far with Rob Klepper on the mike, Dean Mills of Dean Mills Video Productions http://www.millsvideoproductions.com/ behind the camera and other talented folks working behind the scenes. As you can see above, the video feed has looked good.

USAC also has timing and scoring running. To watch the live webcast on USACRacing.com, click HERE. The website also has images posted from earlier today.

Wise Fastest in Silver Crown Hotlaps

Josh Wise had the fastest time in the first group’s practice at 22.091. Shane Cottle had the fastest time 21.687 in the 2nd hotlaps session. Cottle got around at the end of the session with no contact.

Jesse Hockett fastest in final group at 22.215

Top Five Times in USAC Silver Crown Hotlaps at Manzanita
No. 28 Shane Cottle 21.687
No. 4 Josh Wise 22.091
No. 10 Levi Jones 22.181
No. 199 Jesse Hockett 22.215
No. 29 Bud Kaeding 22.286

This Looks Worse Than It Was

It looks like the No. 22 and 27 Silver Crown cars are about to hook up and go for a ride in hot laps but that is not the case as disaster is averted.

The images in this post are courtesy of USACRacing.com and may not be used or lifted and posted on any other website.

USAC Opens the Season Tonight/ Cup Entry List Could Thin /Andretti Has a Sponsor/ Wind Tunnel Podcast/ Why No Eyecandy?

2009-02-19T22:54:00.005-06:00

USAC Opens the Season Tonight

Well the 2009 USAC National Series open their season tonight at Manzanita Speedway in Phoenix. One of the drivers running Friday and Saturday will be Jessie Hockett. Hockett who is driving for team owner Carl Edwards says getting the opportunity to drive for someone he looks up to is unreal.

“2004 was Carl Edward’s first year in the Camping World Truck Series and I met him at an autograph signing. I asked him “how do I get to where you are?” And he said, “Win as many races as you can in as many cars as you can.” The photo he signed said never give up. It hangs in my office to remind me.”

In addition to running in USAC’s Silver Crown division at Manzanita, Jesse Hockett is slated to run in USAC’s Sprint division driving the VKCC/ Tom Buch No. 13. Hockett has two wins in USAC sprints coming into this weekend. Both wins were recorded at Perris Auto Speedway in California.

Cup Entry List Could Thin

Speaking of California, the entry list for the Cup race this weekend has 48 entries. Of those 5 are TBA or unsponsored. That leaves 43 sponsored cars, the maximum NASCAR allows in a race. It is quite possible we will see no bumping in Cup before the year is out.

Andretti Has a Sponsor
While times are tough for some teams, Open Wheeler John Andretti’s team landed Window World as a sponsor for the next four Cup races.

Wind Tunnel Podcast

I am always looking for new news and sports information programming to put on my Ipod. Now the good folks at Wind Tunnel are making their program available via podcast. You can find the links to signup in Wind Tunnel portion of SpeedTV.com.

Why No Eyecandy?

Now to the mailbag, a reader emailed me why doesn’t SPEED put Eyecandy on their website or make a big compellation CD and sell it.. The problem is broadcast rights. Generally programs allow other broadcasters to use highlights for news purposes. That is how we get Eyecandy. You would have to get permission to post the video online or sell it in a compellation CD.

Later this Weekend
Coverage Saturday and Sunday on our Open Wheelers on action both in Phoenix and California.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of FOX, Speed and NASCAR Images.

TV Thursday/ TV Ratings up for Daytona/ FOX Up On the Wheel When It Comes to Race Broadcasts/ Cue the Duck/ Sexy for a Pit Pass

2009-02-18T21:04:00.028-06:00

TV Thursday
I would like to make this a weekly feature and discuss media issues regarding racing highlighting the good, bad and sometimes ugly.

TV Ratings up for Daytona

With the economy tight more folks are staying home and watching TV. Combine that will a great effort put in by employees of FOX and SPEED and you have an increase in ratings.

The broadcast of the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series on SPEED scored a double-digit Nielsen Ratings increase from the season opener in Daytona in 2008. The Friday night race recorded a Nielsen mark of 1.90 (1,393,000 households), making it the No. 1 show on cable during that time period according to a news release from SPEED.

The rating marked an increase of 21 percent from last year’s 1.57 (1,128,000 households). SPEED’s pre-race show, NCWTS Setup hosted by our favorite girl er lady next door, Krista Voda, scored a Nielsen Rating of .80 (585,000 households), up 33 percent from last year’s .60 (434,000 households).

That’s good promotion and the result of hard work by the crew and talent to develop and grow a brand. I think Ms. Voda had something to do with it too.

The trucks head to the mothership this weekend (FOX). The usual Sunday FOX broadcast crew including Krista Voda from the pits will call all of the action. FOX also reported an increase in the numbers.

The folks that made it interesting to watch fendered cars again, averaged a 9.2/19 household rating/share according to fast national figures released by Nielsen Media Research. Folks may be down or not want to travel much but they will watch.

The average audience of 16.0 million viewers placed this year’s Daytona 500 ahead of the NCAA Final Four (15.4 million viewers), Beijing Olympics (15.2 million) (not hard with the crappy NBC coverage), 2008 NBA Finals (14.9 million), and Kentucky Derby (14.2 million). Oh it probably beat the Stanley Cup Finals too on that network that is hard to find on most Comcast cable systems and NBC which could care less if it was showing Lord Stanley’s Cup being passed around or some 16 year old kid falling on his ass in a skateboard competition. Why do you think they play the finals in June? So it wont sink NBC’s rating during sweeps (May). AHEM!!! Oh.. sorry for getting off target. Moving along…

Note: I did not see any numbers from ESPN2 on the Nationwide Series broadcast.

FOX Up On the Wheel When It Comes to Race Broadcasts

The reason I would rather watch a race on FOX over watching a NASCAR race on any other station is the fact they do show and tell better than anyone.

No special shop is needed or special TNT 360 rotating thing-a-ma-giggy stage.

Here Jeff Hammond, a natural for TV, explains why the tires are going south because of camber issues and how teams can make proper changes.

Cue the Duck

Since AFLAC came into NASCAR,

they have had fun from the late Benny Parsons cueing the duck

to their latest add which shows an out of character devious duck stealing the No. 99 car

and taking it on a ride with a cute blond in the passenger seat. Edwards figures who stole the car when he sees the foul offender’s feathers on the floor.

Nice work.

Sexy for a Pit Pass

Ask.com made a splash with its ads this weekend. The one where the guy tells the gal that she has to dress sexy like the woman behind them in order to get a pit pass was my favorite outside of the dipstick ad.

Think With Your Dipstick

My favorite ad from the weekend was the Castrol ad where the man asked Jimmy to think with his dipstick.

A lesson we should all learn.

TV Schedule
With no Open Wheel action on TV this weekend, no race Friday, two races on Saturday and one race on Sunday, the TV schedule left a lot to be desired so I broke from what I normally like to do and added the practice sessions. If you get too NASCARed out on Saturday,

you can flip to the CBC or in the US the NHL Network and watch one of the best produced TV programs of the year,

Hockey Day in Canada. Ok, here is the schedule:

Friday

12:30 pm NNS Practice SPEED

3:00 pm NSCS Practice SPEED

4:30 pm NCWTS Pole Qualifying SPEED

6:30 pm NSCS Coors Light Pole Qualifying SPEED

8:30 pm NNS Final Practice SPEED

Saturday

12:30 pm NNS Coors Light Pole Qualifying SPEED

3:00 pm NCWTS: San Bernardino County 200 FOX

5:00 pm NSCS Final Practice SPEED

7:00 pm NNS Countdown ESPN2

7:45 pm NNS: Stater Bros. 300 ESPN2

Sunday
3:30 pm NASCAR RaceDay SPEED

5:00 pm NSCS Pre-Race Show FOX

6:00 pm NSCS: Auto Club 500 FOX

7:00 pm SPEED Report

9:00 pm Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain SPEED

Later this Week
One more story before Manzanita, WT goes to the Pod and I will answer questions from the mailbag.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of CBC, FOX, ESPN2, Speed and NASCAR Images.

USAC Kicks Off the Season at Manzanita/ Leffler Looking Forward to Home Cooking/ Honda Miffed Over Danica Sprawled on a Ford/ Later this Week

2009-02-17T21:17:00.007-06:00

USAC Kicks Off the Season at Manzanita

USAC will head to the Valley of the Sun this weekend to kick off their season. Manzanita Speedway will host all three national series in the “Copper on Dirt” this Friday and Saturday. This weekend will mark one of only two USAC national triple headers this season (the other one being the Four Crown Nationals at Eldora) although Iowa Speedway will host all three national series, just not on the same weekend.

The schedule for Friday calls for qualifying, heat races and 10-lap shootouts for each series. Saturday’s slate calls for semi features followed by 25-lap midget, 40-lap sprint and 50-lap Silver Crown races. The opener also offers Lucas Oil USAC/CRA Sprint and Western Midget points. Defending USAC series champions are Jerry Coons Jr. (K & N Silver Crown and National Sprints), Cole Whitt (Mopar National Midgets), Mike Spencer (Lucas Oil USAC/CRA Sprints) and Nic Faas (Western Midgets).

All are expected to compete in all three programs. Accomplished winged and non-winged sprint car driver Jesse Hockett is hoping to repeat his success from late November of 2008 when swept the three-day ASCS Western World race.

“I like Manzanita Speedway because it is big and fast,” said Hockett. “I like the speed of it and there are a lot of different lines and ways to run the track.”

Other drivers to keep an eye on include Jeremy Sherman and Kevin Swindell.

Leffler Looking Forward to Home Cooking

After a rough start to his 2009 NASCAR Nationwide Series season, Open Wheeler Jason Leffler is looking to get back on the horse and try for a win again, this time at home in California. Last week Jason Leffler was penalized for five laps for what NASCAR deemed “rough driving” when he started this three car pile up at Daytona.

“For obvious reasons we’re looking to put last week behind us,” said the Long Beach native. “The real season starts at California because your performance there will be a pretty good indicator of where you stand in comparison with everyone else and what areas you need to work on for the first part of the season.”

Jason Leffler and his No. 38 Great Clips Toyota team are one of the series-only regulars predicted to be a major player in the NASCAR Nationwide Series championship this year. Leffler’s best finish at Auto Club Speedway was seventh in 2005. The year prior, he sat on the pole.

“There’d be nothing better than to win there,” he said. “It’s a place that we’ve never run well at but we’re always striving to. I’ve got a lot of family and friends out there. I think we’re going to have all that in our favor this year.”

Honda Miffed Over Danica Sprawled on a Ford

According to PressDog.com, the folks at Honda were not happy with Danica Patrick half nude on the hood of a Sheby Cobra. Oh the humanity of a female bikini clad driver gracing the pages of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue lying on top of a Ford.

Note: the following link will take you to a false story with a lot of sarcasim.
http://pressdog.typepad.com/dogblog/2009/02/honda-miffed-over-danica-sprawled-on-a-ford.html
This link will take you to the photos on SI.com:
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009_swimsuit/?eref=FromAOLSwim09

Later this Week
We have a few good stories that I am working on for later this week in the blog. We will answer questions regarding Wind Tunnel, recap the best TV moments from Daytona and have an updated TV schedule for this weekend.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of SI.com, ESPN2, Speed and NASCAR Images.

Monday Morning Hangover/ The Return of Wind Tunnel/ On Second Review/ Stewart Happy with New Start/ NASCAR May Consider Special Sign

2009-02-16T12:20:00.021-06:00

Monday Morning Hangover

There were things that were good and things that were bad from the opening weekend of racing, now with my head hurting from all of the racing coverage, I will attempt to tackle it all.

The Return of Wind Tunnel

We start of first with the return of the best racing program on TV. Wind Tunne1 with Dave Despain debuted Sunday night with a load on the program’s plate beginning with the Daytona 500 and the hot button issue of Dale Earnhardt Jr. turning Brian Vickers. Despain brought in Darrell Waltrip to discuss the issues.

One interesting issue that a caller brought up was the tires and the opportunity for NASCAR to start using technology and tire sensors. The “I don’t know how it would work” that Darrell Waltrip gave doesn’t cut it. Hey NASCAR, when you go to Indianapolis this summer, drop into an IRL garage and they will show you.

Wind Tunnel announced that the program has a revamped page at SpeedTV.com. The new page features a live chat, features and a new message board. More on this later in the week.

It’s A Robin Miller Night

To balance out the NASCAR coverage, WT had Robin Miller on the program. Miller updated viewers on what is going on in the open wheel world and tackled the rumor of Danica Patrick in F1 saying it is not going to happen.

He also talked about when Sammy Swindell will retire and showed video of the Chili Bowl.

Miller said he expects Swindell to keep on racing for a while like Steve Kinser because it is all they know.

Just a quick note, the opening image at the top is a shot from WT of the lower part of the set. Often that part of the set is filled with books and die cast cars but every once and a while they recreate a racing scene from earlier in the day. The scene above is the beginning of the big wreck.

On Second Review
On that note, take a second look at be at the big wreck. Dale Earnhardt Jr. goes below the yellow line and Brian Vickers goes to block.

Notice in this shot that Vickers’ tires are also below the yellow line. Maybe that is why NASCAR assessed no penalty. We never heard from NASCAR why there was no penalty assessed which looks pretty bad. It appears if you have a NASCAR name like Wallace and Earnhardt, then you get a free pass and if you name is Vickers or Leffler then you are screwed.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. A Little Confused

Needless to say the 51st running of the Daytona 500 was a bad day for Dale Earnhardt Jr. Look at the quotes from him after the race and then look at the images and see how wrong he was.

“On the back straightaway, I was a lap down trying to get my lap back and I had a really, really good run and Brian (Vickers), he was side-by-side with somebody for the lead and I went on the inside and he drove me down, down almost into the grass below the line and I didn’t have much control over the car at that point. I was just trying to get back on the race track and I hit him in the quarter panel and spun him out.”

Actually in the images courtesy of FOX, he was nowhere near the grass. Besides the fact that you can’t go below the yellow line. Dale Earnhardt Jr. should have gotten out of the gas or figured out a way to pass Brian Vickers.

“If he’d have just held his ground, I was the lapped car. I wasn’t even racing for position. That was unfortunate.”

Dale Earnhardt Jr. is wrong here again, Vickers was a lapped car. Maybe his spotter or someone could have helped him on this. Here is more of the conversation of Dale Earnhardt Jr. unloading on Brian Vickers:

Reporter Question: WHAT HAPPENED OUT THERE WITH THE BIG WRECK?

Jr.: "I got a run on Vickers and the guy he was beside. I went to the bottom of 'em. Vickers drove me below the line. He ran in to me and sent me below the line. I was just trying not to run into, drive in to the grass and get my car under control and try and get above the line so I get penalized for being down there, I ran in to his quarter panel and spun him out."

Reporter Question: DOES IT MATTER THAT BLOCKING WAS GOING ON?

Jr.: "He shouldn't have started that, it would have never happened. If he had held his ground, who knows? He would have probably got the back or got the position back eventually, but at that point in the race, that was pretty reckless."

Reporter Question: WERE YOU CONCERNED THAT NASCAR WAS GOING TO PENALIZE YOU?

Jr.: "Penalize me? For what? I got ran in to and sent below the line. What the hell? I don't want to go down there, I didn't aim to go down there, and I got sent down there. What the hell am I supposed to do? Then what am I supposed to do? Stay down there? No. I got to get back up on the race track. It was unfortunate man. If he wasn't so damn reckless, we would have never had that problem, that would never happen. As far as I am concerned, it is all his responsibility.”

Reporter Question: WHAT HAPPENED OUT THERE WITH YOU AND (BRIAN) VICKERS?

Jr.: "I got a run on him and he saw me coming. I had a big ole' run on him and I went to the inside. I didn't try to make no late move and try to make it some surprise or anything, I just kind of eased on over there and he went to block me and hit me in the fender and sent us both off. Sent me down toward the grass and trying to recover my car I got back into him coming back up the race track. I don't hate it for him but for everybody else that got wrecked."

Reporter Question: WAS IT ACCIDENTAL?

Jr.: "Yeah it was accidental. I didn't want to wreck the field. I mean he drove me down almost into the grass. I was trying to get back up on the race track."

Reporter Question: JEFF BURTON AND YOU HAD CONVERSATION, WHAT WAS THAT ABOUT?
Jr.: "I was trying to get my lap back and I think it was three-wide and put him in the middle sometime or another on the restart and he got shuffled back to the back and wrecked and he was upset with me for making it three-wide and I should have worked with him and all that. But rains coming time to try to win the race you know what I mean. Time to try to get back on the lead lap. We had a pit stop where our right-front tire I was told was only an inch on the line and I got penalized a lap for that. I don't feel like that's a fair trade but maybe its time we re-evaluate that rule. So I had to run hard and Vickers could have just held his ground. I had a great run. I was a lapped car anyways, I wasn't battling for the lead but he drove us down in the grass almost and I didn't have much control over my car after that."

Tony Stewart Happy with New Start

This past week had a lot of ups and downs for Tony Stewart. He won the Nationwide Series race but saw racecar after racecar from his own team damaged in incidents.

“I am proud of Tony Gibson and Ryan and Darian Grubb, Bobby Hutchens and all the guys that came down here and helped to get two cars ready,” said Stewart. “Considering we lost three cars, to still have a car finish in the top-10 you can't be that disappointed. I'm really proud of everyone at Stewart Haas and real appreciative of Gene Haas and everybody at Haas Automation for giving us this opportunity.”

Stewart went on to say that he expected to see Ryan Newman have better luck in the next few weeks.

NASCAR May Consider Mandating Special Blinking Sign Color for the 88 Team
(Note: the following story is sarcasm although the quote is real)

NASCAR today announced that are strongly considering giving the No. 88 cup team of Dale Earnhardt Jr. it’s own special colored sign after listening to post race comments from Dale Earnhardt Jr. following the Daytona 500.

"If you look down this pit road, my sign is pink and every other sign is pink so it’s hard to see,” said Earnhardt responding to a question about why he missed his pit box. “They're all about the same color. Everybody says all right I'm going to make mine yellow this week then two weeks later everybody's is yellow. I was under a lot of pressure too. I was putting a lot of pressure on myself to get up in there and try to lead a lap and all that and I just wasn't thinking good. I mean I can't really blame it on anybody but myself."

In following precedent set at the Daytona 500 where you just can’t penalize Jr. for fear of a riot even if he takes out eight cars in the process, NASCAR is doing what ever the golden child wants. The sanctioning organization is looking for suggestions on a color that Earnhardt will be able to see.

My suggestion is for Hendrick Motorsports to install LEDs similar to running rabbits at airports in the pavement. In a related story, NASCAR is also looking into doing away with the rule that the 88 team must pit in it’s pitbox. The new proposal is for the 88 team to pit wherever the hell they feel like including the front stretch.

Later this Week
We have a few good stories that I am working on for later this week in the blog. We will have a preview of the USAC opener at Manzanita, answer questions regarding Wind Tunnel, recap the best TV moments from Daytona and have an updated TV schedule for this weekend.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of FOX, ESPN2, Speed and NASCAR Images.

Matt Kenseth Wins the Daytona 500

2009-02-15T17:53:00.004-06:00

Matt Kenseth Wins the Daytona 500
Matt Kenseth dodged the biggest wreck of the day to become the winner of the 51st running of the Daytona 500.

We have a lot of note to get through so let’s start at the top with the green flag.

Lap 8 and Aric Almirola brings our the fist caution of the day on lap 8 when Jamie McMurry gets out of line and Almirola gives him room.

Then Almirola gets tapped from behind and spins.

The “competition caution” comes out to check tires and tweak on the car on lap 26.

Travis Kvapil hit the wall on lap 55 bringing out the third caution of the day. During the caution, Dale Earnhardt Jr. who was just leading the race missed his turn into his pit box and went a lap down.

During the caution a commercial for AMP Energy Drink’s website gave a preview of their film of Dale Earnhardt Jr. go cat racing friends. Good cross promotion.

Scott Speed gets loose and Joey Logano moves to avoid Speed

and right into nose of Greg Biffle turning Logano around,

across the track and a hard hit into the inside barrier. Joey Logano walked away uninjured.

During the caution, FOX ran an extended commercial I mean preview for the movie Watchmen. I’m not going to gripe about the interruption but I thought the preview was a little to violent for me. It is rated R. I think they need to be a little more sensitive about violence in the movie previews.

We are now halfway and Kyle Busch is in the lead with rain on the way.

Mechanical gremlins begin to appear on lap 84 as Jeff Gordon’s camber setting results in a tire that had severe ware. Gordon pits as does San Hornish Jr. whose car is overheating.

Two laps later the caution comes out as David Stremme’s right rear tire blows as he comes onto pit road.

The rain is getting closer and only 77 laps remain

when all H-E-double hockey sticks break loose.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. gets a run on Brian Vickers. Vickers blocks and Earnhardt goes below the yellow line.

Instead of getting back into line, Dale Earnhardt Jr. turns Brian Vickers

right into the rest of the field wrecking eight cars and taking out several of the best performers of the race including

Kurt Busch, Robby Gordon, Denny Hamlin, Kyle Busch, Jamie McMurray, Jimmie Johnson, Scott Speed, Brian Vickers and Carl Edwards.

The question now is, would NASCAR penalize Dale Earnhardt Jr. five laps for hard driving just like the day before when they penalized Jason Leffler during the Nationwide Series race.

“Apparently he wanted a caution really bad,” said Brian Vickers to FOX’s Matt Yokum when asked what happened.

Lets take another look at the wreck.

Notice where Matt Kenseth is. He came pretty close to being wrecked.

During the caution rain drops fell as a patch of rain moved just north of Daytona International Raceway.

Green flag and everyone is racing hard.

Caution again with 63 laps to go when Jeff Burton gets into the wall

and Paul Menard is the victim.

Green flag again with 58 laps to go. Three laps later Aric Almirola goes on an agricultural excursion when he is hit from behind by Sam Hornish Jr.

The caution was extended by rain that began to surround the track. Matt Kenseth sat in this car hoping that the rain would continue.

During the rain delay in an interview with FOX’s Dick Bergeron, Dale Earnhardt Jr. blamed Brian Vickers for causing the major pileup saying that wrecked eight cars. Dale Earnhardt Jr. went onto say he was sorry that all the cars were wrecked but he wasn’t sorry that Brian Vickers got wrecked. During the same interview he complained about the penalty that NASCAR gave him for a pitstop that was outside his pit box (his tires were on the white line). For just a moment, it appeared that Earnhardt had a god complex and nothing he could do was wrong. That can probably be chalked up to adrenaline after hopping out of the car.

After looking at radar,

NASCAR decided to call the race

and declared Matt Kenseth the winner. It was the first Daytona 500 win for Matt Kenseth and Jack Roush.

Here is where the Open Wheelers finished in the Daytona 500:
1. (Matt Kenseth)
3. A.J. Allmendinger
8. Tony Stewart
13. Jeff Gordon
14. Juan Montoya
15. Casey Mears
18. Carl Edwards
19. John Andretti
29. Kasey Kahne
32. Sam Hornish Jr
34. Robby Gordon
35. Scott Speed
36. Ryan Newman

If you missed the Daytona 500, it is slated to reair on Speed on Thursday at 12pm eastern.

Just a quick personal note, thanks for visiting Open Wheeler. We had viewers from all of the United States and Canada today. We are planning to update almost every day. Thanks again for visiting and remember, May is not that far away.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of FOX, The National Weather Service, Speed and NASCAR Images.

FOX Prerace Coverage

2009-02-15T14:38:00.017-06:00

FOX Prerace Coverage

The prerace show starts off pretty good

with whip arounds to the various pit reporters who will be covering the days action including Krista Voda.

FOX then promotes the upcoming Keith Urban prerace concert and then an interview with Urban.

This leads us a music video with Keith Urban singing and FOX’s big push on Digger.

Digger is a cartoon creature that was created to promote FOX’s installation on lipstick cameras in racetracks for a different angle. Originally pioneered by Terry Linger and ESPN during USAC races at O’Reilly Raceway Park (back then it is IRP).

Now FOX will have an animated cartoon once a week featuring Digger in their prerace show.

Of course they will be selling Digger gear on various websites including the speed store at SpeedTV.com.

Oh yeah, they also have a Digger comic book for sale.

Thank you capitalism.

Keith Urban now takes the stage. I like his music. He has good taste in women (redheads). But I don’t like where country music is now.

Country is not Nashville, country is LA, entertainment and pop music. Its trendy folks who are good looking who happen to have a banjo. What does a dude from Australia know about the heart of country. He probably knows a lot but my point is that the days of the folks that have lived the country lifestyle becoming top country artists are over.

Now if you are pretty and you can drop a little twang into a song, you are in. Ok.. off the soap box and back to the prerace.

FOX had a few other interesting prerace stories but can’t match their sister at Speed who had three hours of programming. Overall FOX did a good job.

Ok there is the flyby, time to go racing.. gas em up… If you aren’t watching FOX, now is the time to make the move.

We will post a wrapup of the race immediately following the conclusion so please check back immediately after the race.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of FOX, Speed and NASCAR Images.

NASCAR Raceday on Speed

2009-02-15T13:02:00.008-06:00

NASCAR Raceday on Speed
NASCAR Raceday has brought out great nuggets on your favorite Open Wheelers.

Wendy Venturini interviewed Tony Stewart and Ryan Newman on the new team and having so much in common from open wheel racing to hunting. It was a nice sit down interview that Speed does so well in their pre race coverage.

Ken Squire talked about CBS’s efforts to bring racing to the fans with the big in car cameras. Squire noted that the crews weren’t happy about carrying the heavy camera but they understood the importance of exposure.

Ken Squire also produced a look back at the first high banked Daytona 500. The piece was well written and sent chills up my spine. If you can find it out there on the web or at SpeedTV.com, it is definitely worth a look.

Wendy V caught up with A.J. Allmendinger who admitted that he cried after learning that he solidified himself in the field at Daytona for the 500. You could tell that A.J. was all giddy about the race. It is too bad reunification had not come before he left for fendered land.

Time for Picks
Speed always does a good job talking about subjects like to know about at home and they make the views feel like their friends by making picks at every race. The picks are below but I think Wendy Venturini is the closest to being right.

NASCAR on Speed picks to with the Daytona 500
Jimmy Bill Elliott
Kenny Jeff Gordon
JR Jamie McMurry
Hermie Sadler Juan Pablo Montoya
Wendy V Mark Martin

The weather is a little bit questionable but the latest radar shows the R word going north and south of the track. I am optimistic that they will get this in today.

Ok, Coverage on Speed is over, now on to FOX…

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of Speed and NASCAR Images.

Welcome to Our Coverage of the 51st Running of the Daytona 500

2009-02-15T11:58:00.004-06:00

Welcome to Our Coverage of the 51st Running of the Daytona 500

Today is the second biggest day in racing outside the Indianapolis 500. It is a bog day for this blog and a big day for everyone that covers and follows Motorsports.

Speed has been on the air since 10am (central) and will continue with their prerace coverage until 1pm until the throw it to FOX.

As you probably know our blog went dormant for two years but is now back with the same coverage you have expected from us. We have been covering Daytona all week and now will do coverage of the big day. We will have summaries and other information throught the day including a wrap of our favorite program, Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain which airs 8-9pm (central) on Speed.Dave’s guests tonight include Darrell Waltrip and the 2009 Daytona 500 Winning Car Owner. WT will also have Robin Miller to share his thoughts on the upcoming IndyCar season.

Wendy Venturini has been doing a yeoman’s work this morning interviewing anyone and everyone in the pits.

Here she interviews Carl Edwards about his thoughts and he says he is just tingling with excitement. Yep it’s going to be a big day.

Ideas, thoughts, questions? Drop me a line at bjohnson_292@comcast.net.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of Speed and NASCAR Images.

Stewart Overcomes to Win Nationwide Race/ Newman and Stewart to Backup Cars/ The Return of Wind Tunnel/ It’s a Robin Miller Night

2009-02-15T01:14:00.015-06:00

Stewart Overcomes to Win Nationwide Race
After suffering through a terrible final practice session which saw both of the Cup cars he owned damaged, Tony Stewart bounced back to win the Nationwide Series Race.

Former IRL pit goddess Jamie Little introduces us to the over the wall pit dude camera for 2009.

Green flag and we are off racing. Lap 17 and Michael Annett suffers a flat right rear and gets his car off the track with out incident.

On to lap 56 where Brian Keselowski spins after a little contact. The caution gave Annett lucky dog honors.

The race was on ESPN2 so that means a mandatory wreck during a commercial break. (I know it is not ESPN2’s fault but this was a trend in 2008 and their bad luck hit again in the 2009 opener.)

Jason Leffler gets into the back of Steven Wallace and Wallace goes for a ride through the grass

and then up the track

collecting Scott Lagasse Jr. and Justin Allgaier.

NASCAR handed down a five lap penalty to Jason Leffler for causing the three car pileup.

10 laps to go and Brad Keselowski has a tire go south and hits the wall.

We go green with only 7 laps left. Kyle Busch is all over Tony Stewart’s bumper

but Stewart holds off Busch and Carl Edwards for the win.

Open Wheelers Results

1. Tony Stewart
2. Carl Edwards
28. Mike Bliss
33. Jason Leffler
35. Michael Annett
40. Justin Allgaier

Newman and Stewart to Backup Cars

As we alluded to earlier Ryan Newman and Tony Stewart will start from the back of the pack following a wreck in the final practice session for the Daytona 500. It appeared that a tire on Ryan Newman’s car blew causing him to spin right in front of his car owner Tony Stewart. The accident trashed both cars enough to force the two Open Wheelers to backup cars and the back of the pack. Team owner Tony Stewart was not happy with Goodyear.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do,” said Stewart. “I’m ticked right now. I’m not happy, I’m not cordial, I’m not nice, I’m not anything right now, and I shouldn’t be. If it was because two guys wrecked and it was a driver’s mistake, that’s one thing. But a manufacturer that has the sole deal here, they don’t have any competition and they can’t give us something to keep us from having problems like this. So I don’t know. I’m just amazed at how much everybody kisses their butts right now.”

The blowout was the second one for Ryan Newman this year at Daytona. He had a tire go south on him during the Twin 125’s Thursday. Stewart with drive the car he drove in the Budweiser Shootout last weekend. Newman will now drive what was originally Tony Stewart’s backup car.

The Return of Wind Tunnel
Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain kicks off their 7th season Sunday night at 9pm eastern on Speed. As tradition, the season premiere will be live from Daytona. Darrell Waltrip will co-host the show. Their featured guest will be the 2009 Daytona 500 Winning Car Owner.

It’s a Robin Miller Night
Before you give up on the season opener of WT, Open Wheelers will be well represented Sunday. The great one, Robin Miller, will be a guest on Wind Tunnel this Sunday as he shares his thoughts on the upcoming IndyCar season.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of ESPN2, Speed and NASCAR Images.

Bodine Wins Truck Race at Daytona

2009-02-13T21:57:00.018-06:00

Bodine Wins Truck Race at Daytona
Despite not having a sponsor on his truck, Todd Bodine and his team won the Truck Series opener Friday night at Daytona.

Camping World made it’s inaugural run in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series 10th race at Daytona.

The green flag dropped and six laps into the race we had problems

when TJ Bell and Brian Scott get together

and Scott then gets together with Open Wheeler Mike Bliss for our first caution.

Forty two laps later and all H-E-double-hockey-sticks break loose.

Larry Foyt was among the eight trucks that were involved in the mayhem.

The craziness claimed the trucks of

Johnny Benson, Ricky Carmichael, Mike Skinner, James Buescher, Johnny Sauter, Shane Sieg, Jason White and Larry Foyt.

A scary moment on Lap 33 when Brent Raymer got loose on the bottom coming off turn two and hit the wall very very hard.

It appeared that the throttle hung after the first hit and he hit the wall again extremely hard again.

The safety team was right on the spot and thankfully he walked away on his own power.

21 laps to go and Jason White gets into trouble when he gets together with David Star and Rick Crawford.

Last lap now and Todd Bodine holds off Kyle Busch for the win with an unsponsored truck.

A wet Todd Bodine is so excited; he celebrates by dancing in victory lane.

Terry cook finished third. Here is how the few Open Wheelers in the race finished:
1. (Todd Bodine)
3. Terry Cook
20. Larry Foyt
30. Mike Bliss

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of Speed.

Gordon wins one of the Twin 125’s/ Hey Hey AJ, We Love You/ What We Need is a Little More Voda

2009-02-12T21:00:00.029-06:00

Gordon wins one of the Twin 125’s
Jeff Gordon will start third in Sunday’s Daytona 500 after winning one of the two Twin 125 races today at Daytona. Kyle Busch won the other 125.

Speed performed like a well oiled machine with Jeff Hammond and Krista Voda opening the show. Ahh Voda… more on her later in the blog.

The green flag dropped on the first 125 and just 3 laps into the race Kurt Busch went around.

I am over the G commercials.

The G stands for Give it up Gatorade. Plus the mimes freak me out. Back to racing.

Well maybe not. Bill Elliot’s transmission locked under caution and all H-E-hockey sticks broke loose.

Ok, G needs to take a lesson and learn to think with their dipstick. Funniest commercial of the 125’s.

Martin Truex Jr. gets sideways with 12 to go bring out the caution. Truex keeps it off the wall and after final pits tops. Not so fast my friend…

Yellow again for a big pileup with 8 to go involving Sam Hornish Jr. and several other cars. Green flag with 5 to go. Final laps and Jeff Gordon and Tony Stewart are fighting it out for the win.

At the line, Jeff Gordon is your winner.

“It was a great race out there today,” said Gordon. “The car was driving well. It was a lot of fun dicing it up with Martin at the beginning, and then with Tony and Jimmie, McMurray, a bunch of them. I can't even remember all the things that went on there. It was a great race.”

Tony Stewart finished second and will start 5th Sunday. Here is how the rest of the Open Wheelers finished in the 1st 125:
1. Jeff Gordon
2. Tony Stewart
7. Kasey Kahne
14. Casey Mears
16. Sam Hornish Jr.
22. Robby Gordon
25. John Andretti

125 Part 2

Now to race number two and 14 laps into the race, Boris Said gets into Scott Speed. We have our first yellow which gave Ryan Newman an important stop for tires.

The Open Wheeler’s luck wasn’t so good later in the race.

With 13 laps to go, Newman and David Reutiman get together turning the Perdue grad into the wall hard.

And Ryan Newman wanted to know why. Green flag again and Kyle Busch holds off Mark Martin and Brian Vickers for the win.

Congratulations to Busch’s spotter and Open Wheeler Jeff Dickerson for calling the win. Here are how the Open Wheelers finished:
4. Juan Montoya
8. Carl Edwards
10. A.J. Allmendinger
24. Ryan Newman
25. Scott Speed

Here is where the Open Wheelers will start for the Daytona 500:
1. (Martin Truex Jr.)
3. Jeff Gordon
5. Tony Stewart
8. Juan Montoya
15. Kasey Kahne
16. Carl Edwards
20. A.J. Allmendinger
25. Casey Mears
29. Sam Hornish Jr.
31. Robby Gordon
36. Ryan Newman
37. John Andretti
38. Scott Speed

Hey Hey AJ, We Love You
It is Valentines Day weekend and new team owner is sharing the love and respect for his racing idol. As most of you know Open Wheeler Tony Stewart debuted his new team at Daytona with fellow Open Wheeler Ryan Newman driving a second car. Stewart chose the number 14 to honor his racing hero A.J. Foyt.

The 1972 Daytona 500 winner responded by showing up on Stewart’s pit box, headset on and ready to call the shots if needed. But was A.J. really talking to Stewart? A post race conversation with the media answers that question:

Q: Tony, the TV camera showed A.J. up on your pit box with the headphones. Can you tell us, was he set up to be able to talk to you?
TONY STEWART: Oh, God, no. No, no, no (laughter). We actually had a special radio sitting there just for him. It had the button on it and everything, but it didn't do anything when you pushed the button. I'm not joking.
Q: A pretend radio?
TONY STEWART: Yeah. Can you imagine having to sit there and drive with him yelling at you all day long? I've kind of done that in Silver Crown cars a little bit. I've learned my lesson. I know better than to give him a radio he can yell into. The best part about it was when we were coming to the media center. He stopped me. He said he gave me an A minus for the day. I said, Coming from you, that's as good as an A plus from everybody else. He's your toughest critic, but at the same time he's one of our biggest fans, too. It just means a lot that he cares enough about what we're doing to want to spend the rest of the week with us here and be a part of it.

What We Need is a Little More Voda

Krista Voda grew up in Clinton, Iowa and attended the University of Northern Iowa so she was basically born with a racing gene. She has been in the FOX Sports family since reporting from the pits at NASCAR Truck races and on the set of Totally NASCAR.

When the program folded she disappeared to Pittsburgh to work for the FSN there. Thankfully Speed executives heard the cry of the fans and brought her back.

She now hosts the pre-race show for the NASCAR Truck Series. FOX executives like her so much that she is often seen reporting from the pits on Cup races and sidelines from NFL, College and baseball games.

She is a storyteller by heart and in my opinion, the best female in the business. I was told a while back that he had gotten married but I cannot confirm that. She does not wear a wedding ring but my ex investigative news reporter sensors tell me she is taken. But we can still dream.

Her website is http://www.kristavoda.com/

All images courtesy of SPEED and Fox Sports.

Open Wheeler Notes/ Pre-Race Hottie Wendy Venturini

2009-02-11T22:51:00.008-06:00

Open Wheeler Notes:
USAC kicks off their season with the triple header, Copper on Dirt at Manzanita Speedway next weekend Feb. 20-21.

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. is slated to race in the NASCAR Nationwide Series. The Mississippi Open Wheeler is scheduled to share the No. 16 CitiFinancial/ 3M Ford with Greg Biffle, Matt Kenseth and Colin Braun. Stenhouse is slated to drive in seven races including his home track Memphis. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. made his first USAC start at the dirt track at Memphis Motorsports Park back in 2004.

Jeff Gordon needed 42 starts before his first Cup win. Now with 41 starts since his last win, is he due at Daytona or will he go on the longest starts with out wins of his career?

The NASCAR Truck Series will celebrate its tenth race at Daytona this weekend. Friday’s rumble should be a great race.

Pre-Race Hottie Wendy Venturini
Wendy Venturini is one of our most searched for names.

At the time of this writing she is 30. She is a graduate of North Carolina. Ms. Venturini is the daughter of two-time ARCA Champion Bill Venturini.

Her career on Speed started with her working as a pit reporter on ARCA race broadcasts. Her professionalism was tested early as she had to report on an accident involving her older brother, Billy Venturini. She reported on his condition and the other drivers that day. You could tell that she was concerned but not shaken.

When Speed started their pre-race coverage, they invited Wendy allong for the ride. She has also served as a pit reporter in NASCAR’s truck series and became the first female play-by-play announcer in auto racing history by calling a race on one of DirecTV's NASCAR Hot Pass channels.

Perverts using search engines must really like her because they use terms like “Wendy Venturini nipple slip,” “Wendy Venturini nude” and “Wendy Venturini” topless to find her according to our tracking system which notes what websites and keywords are used to visit this site. I hate to break your hearts but she has never done nude or anything close to that. As a matter of fact she is married to Jarrad Egert, an engine tuner for Tony Stewart. Wendy is a top notch talent and a key role player in Speed’s pre-race show. Her personal website is http://www.wendyventurini.com/.

All images courtesy of Open Wheeler and Speed

Danica Gets Nearly Naked Again/ More about Manske

2009-02-10T21:18:00.010-06:00

Danica Gets Nearly Naked Again
As promised today begins a look at your favorite female TV sports reporters. We will get to today’s feature but first some news.

Once again Danica Patrick has shed her driving suit for a swimsuit. Ms. Patrick and other female athletes and models will appear in the latest issue of Sports Illustrated. SI.com posted 34 photos of Danica like the one below on their website.

(Image courtesy of photographer Marlena Bielinska and SI.com)

The photos were shot in a New York studio with a silver Shelby Cobra 427. This is the second year in a row Danica Patrick has appeared in the SI issue.

“This year’s swimsuit photo shoot for Sports Illustrated was a lot of fun,” said Patrick, who will be featured on the cover of the May issue of Shape. “Most of the photo shoots I have done in the past have been in studios so I felt comfortable. The photos turned out great.”

The cover of the magazine features a shot of Patrick on the upper right corner of the cover. As a bonus, each of the approximately 6,000 7-Eleven stores in North America will hand out 25 commemorative Danica/IndyCar Series posters with the first 25 purchases of the Swimsuit Issue. A total of 151,500 posters have been printed, each featuring Patrick in a swimsuit along with the '09 IndyCar Series schedule.

You can find all of the photos including behind the scenes images and video on Sports Illustrated’s website by clicking here and here.

More about Manske
Nichole Manske is currently host of ESPN’s NASCAR Now. As of this writing, she is 28 years old. Manske is originally from the same hometown as Danica Patrick. In fact she went to the same high school as Danica. Danica and Nichole were both cheerleaders.

In 1998 Nichole Manske competed and won Miss Illinois Teen USA. Manske attended Northern Illinois University. Her first job was at WREX-TV. From there she went to WANE-TV and then to WISH-TV in Indy.

While there she began working for the IMS Radio Network. According to the Indianapolis Star, she has dated several drivers including Dan Weldon.

In 2006 she moved to Charlotte to work for Speed hosting The Speed Report.

While on the program her choice in clothing was a little different.

She also changed here hair rotating between blonde to brunette and finally to a funky black.

In 2008 she left Speed to go work for ESPN hosting NASCAR Now. This year the IRL announced that Nichole Manske became engaged to Penske Racing’s Ryan Briscoe who has a place in Charlotte where Penske Racing is now based. Congratulations to the happy couple.

Danica Patrick image courtesy of photographer Marlena Bielinska and SI.com. Images in the Nichole Manske article courtesy of Speed, Miss Illinois Teen USA, photographer Shawn Payne of IndyCar.com

Readers of this Blog Love Wendy and Krista/ The Return of the TV Schedule

2009-02-09T19:46:00.009-06:00

Readers of this Blog Love Wendy and Krista
This past Saturday, this website saw its biggest traffic in a year because of folks searching for the names Krista Voda

and Wendy Venturini.

Nichole Manske was also a popular name.

Often the searches were sent by perverts that were Googling terms such as “Krista Voda engaged,” “Nichole Manske sex” and the ever popular “Wendy Venturini nude.” Since the demand is high, and Daytona is Thursday with the Twin 125’s, it is time to give you what you want. No you perverts, not naked photos but information on these talented women. Nichole Manske will be up tomorrow,

followed by Wendy Venturini and then everybody’s favorite girl next door,

Krista Voda.

The Return of the TV Schedule
With that out of the way, I am happy to bring back a favorite feature of this site and that is the TV schedule. Normally I list all of the programs that I am aware of where you can see Open Wheelers in action. This week I am also listing all practices and extra shows that will happen during the season even though they will not be listed.

A few things to note:
The good folks at Speed will rerun the Twin 125’s on Thursday night incase you were at work and missed it. The Chili Bowl runs via tape on Speed Saturday night. ESPN is replaying several Daytona 500s. Sunday marks the return of Open Wheeler’s favorite show, Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain.

All times are Eastern

Wed Feb 11
11:00 am NSCS Practice SPEED

12:00 pm NCWTS Practice SPEED

2:00 pm NSCS Final Practice [for Gatorade Duel] SPEED

5:00 pm NCWTS Practice SPEED
Thu Feb 12
9:30 am Nationwide Series practice ESPN2

11:00 am NCWTS Final Practice SPEED

2:00 pm NSCS: Gatorade Duel at Daytona SPEED

7:00 pm NCWTS Pole Qualifying SPEED

9:00 pm NSCS: Gatorade Duel at Daytona (re-air) SPEED
Fri Feb 13
1:30 pm NSCS Practice SPEED

3:00 pm Nationwide Series qualifying Daytona ESPN2

7:30 pm NCWTS SetUp SPEED

8:00 pm NCWTS: NextEra Energy Resources 250 SPEED
Sat Feb 14
10:30 am NSCS Final Practice SPEED

12:00 pm NASCAR Countdown ESPN2

1:15 pm Nationwide Series Race - Daytona ESPN2

7:00 pm SPEED Report Special Edition SPEED

8:00 pm 1979 Daytona 500 ESPNC

8:00 pm Chili Bowl Midget Nationals SPEED

10:00 pm 1998 Daytona 500 ESPNC
Sun Feb 15
12:00 am 2007 Daytona 500 ESPNC

1:00 am ESPN Original Movie 3 ESPN2

11:00 am NASCAR RaceDay SPEED

2:00 pm NSCS Pre-Race Show: Daytona 500 FOX

3:20 pm NSCS: Daytona 500 FOX

7:00 pm SPEED Report SPEED

9:00 pm Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain SPEED

All images courtesy of SPEED.

The Demise of The Daily Planet

2009-02-08T15:50:00.003-06:00

For two years the blog The Daily Planet offered commentary and coverage of how the TV folks cover NASCAR. Sadly the blog that provided insight into how NASCAR TV happened is no more. TDP at times put heat on NASCAR’s broadcast partners to perform better and I believe the folks in control listened and made the improvements. The blogosphere will never be the same.

An update on Open Wheeler..

For the past few years I had lost me password and coulden't access the blog to post. That has been remedied. More posts will be added soon.

Tony George on Wind Tunnel/ No One Hates Robin Miller/ Danica Patrick to Visit Former Boss

2007-03-18T21:40:00.000-05:00

Tony George on Wind Tunnel

Tony George was a guest on Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain on SPEED tonight. Tony George talked with Despain about the early planning for a potential Moto GP race at Indy. George said the track’s road course would be change slightly for Motor GP and F1. The first race at Indy was a motorcycle race. Then Dave Despain asked about the future of open wheel racing in the United States after reading emails from a few irritated “fans.”

George responded saying, “If I could wave a magic wand and make it all right I would but that is impossible.”

Dave Despain also asked about reunification and his relationship with CCWS boss Kevin Kalkhoven, “We stay in touch. We agreed that we would not be sticking dagger in each other’s back.” Tony George went on to tell Dave Despain that reunification will not come next year but would not rule it out in a few years.

No One Hates Robin Miller
Either you like him or you hate Robin Miller right? Not necessarily true for Tony George. Miller has said before in Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain he believes that Tony George hates him. At the end of the interview, George asked Despain for just a moment to say something. The founder of the IRL wanted to make it very clear that he does not hate Robin Miller.

“I don’t necessarily like Robin or the approach he takes to journalism,” said George. “But I do appreciate though that he speaks with a lot of passion and insight but under no circumstances should people believe that I hate Robin Miller.”

It takes a lot of guts to come on Wind Tunnel when you know you are going to get peppered with the question of reunification. But I was more impressed about George’s statement about Robin Miller. Tony George did not have to bring that up or even make a comment about it. That was a first class move by TG.

This episode of Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain is scheduled to reair at Monday 10am Eastern time.

Danica Patrick to Visit Former Boss

Danica Patrick is headed to visit her former boss David Letterman. The former Rahal/ Letterman driver who now drives for Andretti-Green will appear on Late Night with David Letterman on Tuesday night on CBS.

All images courtesy of SPEED, CBS and World Wide Pants.

TV Racing Giant Passes Away

2007-02-12T19:59:00.000-06:00

I am stunned and saddened by the death of IMS Productions' Buddy McAtee. He took open wheel fans places they could never go otherwise. The news release below sent out by Indianapolis Motor Speedway below sums it up.

LONGTIME IMS EXECUTIVE McATEE DIES AT 53

Longtime Indianapolis Motor Speedway executive Buddy McAtee died Feb. 12 in Indianapolis. He was 53. McAtee passed away at Indiana University Medical Center in Indianapolis with his family at his side. An employee of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and its affiliated companies since 1987, McAtee was promoted to the position of president, chief operating officer and executive producer of IMS Productions on Jan. 15, 2007 after serving as vice president and executive producer since 2002, and leading the company to new heights of creative programming, broadcasting and profitability.

"Buddy's contributions over a 20-year period have been enormous and have allowed us to grow as a company," said Tony George, IMS chief executive officer. "His leadership has taken on many forms, so much so that I have admired him as one of the most positive and energetic people I have ever known. He always was willing to go the extra mile, always willing to bring ideas to the table and offer solutions to problems or challenges. His love of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, having grown up in its shadows, fueled his passion for motorsports. He has been an integral part of the Indy Racing League from its inception and has been instrumental in all of our broadcast relationships. To say I will miss him would be an understatement. For all who knew him, we are privileged. For all who have worked with him, we feel honored."

Indianapolis native McAtee began his broadcasting career with Indianapolis television station WRTV Channel 6 while attending Indiana University, where he earned a degree in telecommunications and forensic studies in 1978. McAtee then spent almost a decade with WRTV as a news photographer, in sales and as promotion director. He joined Wabash Valley Broadcasting, a subsidiary of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, in 1987, and then moved to the IMS staff in 1998 to sell sponsorships and oversee television production for Speedway events such as the Indianapolis 500, Allstate 400 at the Brickyard and the United States Grand Prix. During his tenure at IMS Productions, McAtee was responsible for many nationally broadcast programs, including the "Road to Indy" series, "Pit Pass" and "U.S. Grand Prix View." McAtee also oversaw production and television promotion of all IRL IndyCar Series events. IMS Productions won numerous awards under McAtee’s leadership, including many Telly Awards for outstanding local, regional and cable television commercials and programs, and video and film production. IMS Productions won six of the prestigious awards in 2005 alone.One award for which McAtee was particularly proud was the prestigious accolade IMS Productions won for the one-hour documentary "Heart to Heart." The documentary was written and produced by IMS Productions and chronicled the story of Bailey Hunsberger, a then-12-year-old girl who suffered from various heart defects and sought treatment at Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis."Heart to Heart" won the Best Documentary (Short) in November 2006 at the prestigious New York International Independent Film and Video Festival. The film was placed in the festival's Grand Festival Award category, the highest honor possible. A personal commendation that McAtee was proud to receive was the Torchbearer Award from the Indiana University Cancer Center in May 2006. Seven-time Tour de France winner and cancer survivor Lance Armstrong, who also received treatment at IU Cancer Center, presented the award to McAtee. McAtee is survived by his wife, Judy, and a daughter, Nikki. Visitation is scheduled for 2-8 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 15 at Crown Hill Funeral Home, 700 W. 38th St., Indianapolis. Funeral services are scheduled for 10 a.m. Friday, Feb. 16 at Second Presbyterian Church, 7700 N. Meridian St., Indianapolis. Memorial donations may be made to Indiana University Medical Center, Cancer Research.

Newman and Sea Bass on Letterman

2007-01-16T23:52:00.000-06:00

Newman and Sea Bass on Letterman

Paul Newman and Sebastian Bourdais appeared Tuesday night on the Late Show with David Letterman. Newman told program host David Letterman that he originally wasn’t going to own a team in Champ Car until he found out that Mario Andretti would be the driver.

The decision was a good one as Paul Newman holds up six fingers when asked how many championships his team has won.

Letterman inquired about the team’s secret to their success. Sea Bass said the team was consistent and that is how they won three titles in a row. Letterman then showed the fisticuffs between Sebastian and Paul Tracy.

“Right now he is asking me to get into the fight because he had practice in the previous race (San Jose),” quipped Bourdais.

Sea Bass elaborated saying the rivalry went back to their days racing in Europe. Letterman then asked about Paul Newman’s exploits in the SCCA.

This was Paul’s reaction to his wife’s opinion on him racing. Newman said she told him that Lime Rock would be his last race when she handed him his helmet prior to the race. Newman then went on to win the SCCA sanctioned event. Following the race he said his wife then came up to him and told him he must never give up racing after he won at Lime Rock last year.

David Letterman then closed the interview by complementing Newman saying, “You are the real deal. You have been continuing to get it done.” Paul Newman is the real deal and is probably Open Wheel’s best friend.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of CCWS, World Wide Pants and CBS.

Krista Voda Gets Her Due

2007-01-16T12:51:00.000-06:00

Krista Voda Gets Her Due

For several years now Krista Voda has been working hard to tell the stories of folks in Motorsports. Today FOX and SPEED recognized her efforts by naming her as pit reporter for their NASCAR Nextel Cup Series races on FOX in 2007 and host of SPEED's pre-race show for all of the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series races in 2007. SPEED also announced that she has been signed to a multi-year deal. As Voda told me last season, she is a story teller first and foremost.

The Iowa native says she gets her kicks not from appearing on TV but telling people’s stories. While some NASCAR correspondents may have gotten their jobs based on who they were dating, Voda got promoted on her hard work. Yes she is a hottie but her work speaks for itself. Near the end of the 2006 NCTS season, Krista Voda hosted the Truck Series prerace show. The audition obviously went well

"The competitors, their families, and everyone involved with the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series welcomed me with open arms last year and I'm honored to be back," Voda said in a SPEED news release. "I'm also excited that the pre-race show, which was introduced last fall, will be returning for the full 2007 season and beyond. All of us who cover trucks believe the series produces the best racing... and that the racing is done by some of the sport's most interesting and most genuine people."

Krista Voda began her work in NASCAR for SPEED in 2002 as a reporter and host for Totally NASCAR. Over the last several years, Voda has worked on multiple programs for both networks, including SPEED's coverage of the AMA Supercross Series.

SPEED made the right decision to retain a valuable asset in their lineup.

RIP BH and BP
We have lost two great races in the last two weeks. NASCAR driver and my fellow Tennessean Bobby Hamilton passed away last week after battling cancer. Today we learned that Benny Parsons passed away from cancer. I had the opportunity of seeing both of these men in action. They were both giants in their sport and will be greatly missed, My thoughts and prayers are with their families.

All Images Courtesy of SPEED and NASCAR Images.

Shorter Silver Crown Schedule for 2007/ Santos Wins Race, Phillip Claims 1st PRA Title

2006-12-14T12:09:00.000-06:00

Shorter Silver Crown Schedule for 2007

USAC released their 2007 Silver Crown schedule this morning at the Performance Racing Industry trade show in Orlando. The 2007 schedule is a shortened version of 2006. Gone are new generation pavement races at Kentucky Speedway and the Milwaukee Mile. The series has added a 50 lap dirt race at Manzanita Speedway to replace the pavement version of the Copper World Classic. The pavement race at Phoenix International Raceway now falls on the Thursday of the NASCAR weekend in November. USAC will race at the same venue as the IRL only twice this season, at Homestead Miami Speedway and Richmond International Raceway. The series will race on NASCAR weekends four times at Chicagoland Speedway, O’Reilly Raceway Park at Indianapolis, Kansas Speedway and Phoenix International Raceway. The Iowa Speedway “Triple Crown” race featuring all three of USAC’s national divisions is the only stand-alone pavement race. The Iowa race moves to May and the Terre Haute race moves back to its early June date.

The Hoosier Hundred, Springfield, DuQuoin and the Four Crown Nationals all return to the schedule to close the count, seven pavement races to six dirt races. USAC also released the schedules for their National Midget and Sprint Series. Those schedules are available at http://www.usacracing.com/. The full schedule is published below.

2/9-10 Phoenix, AZ Manzanita Speedway
3/23-25 Homestead, FL Homestead Miami Speedway
5/5 Newton, IA Iowa Speedway
5/25 Indianapolis, IN Indiana State Fairgrounds
6/2 Terre Haute, IN Terre Haute Action Track
6/29-30 Richmond, VA Richmond International Raceway
7/13 Joliet, IL Chicagoland Speedway
7/26 Indianapolis, IN O’Reilly Raceway Park at Indianapolis
8/18 Springfield, IL Illinois State Fairgrounds
9/2 DuQuoin, IL DuQuoin State Fairgrounds
9/22 Rossburg, OH Eldora Speedway
9/28-29 Kansas City, KS Kansas Speedway
11/8 Phoenix, AZ Phoenix International Raceway

Santos Wins Race, Phillip Claims 1st PRA Title
Chet Phillip came to Florida with his sights set on the 2006 Inaugural PRA Big Car Series Title. The Avon, Indiana native qualified 20th and moved through the field to finish 4th clinching the championship. Bobby Santos III scored Carl Edwards/ R.E. Technologies Racing’s first win in the Premiere Racing Association Big Car Series Wednesday night. Santos, driving the No. 99 Ford powered Beast, qualified third turning a time of 20.197. Marc Jessup took the pole with a time of 19.827 around the ¾ mile oval. Bobby Santos however won the draw and would start on the pole but the fast Jessup would get by Santos to take the lead early in the race. Bobby Santos would conserve his equipment and later retake the lead from Jessup. Fellow Ford powered driver, Bobby East would pressure the Franklin, Massachusetts native. The Carl Edwards/ R.E. Technologies Racing team would then use a red flag to make a few minor adjustments to the No. 99 Ford powered Beast. Bobby Santos III was able to pull away when the race resumed winning by a straightaway. Bobby East finished second and Teddy Beach rounded out the top three. Santos’ teammates, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Cameron Dodson brought home top ten finishes 7th and 8th respectively in their first PRA starts.

Unofficial Results
1 . 99 - Bobby Santos III Franklin, PA 100 Running2 . 6 - Bobby East Brownsburg, IN 100 Running3 . 15 - Teddy Beach Donnelsville, OH 100 Running4 . 77 - Chet Fillip Avon, IN 100 Running5 . 91 - Dave Steele Tampa, FL 100 Running6 . 41 - Kyle Nicholas Naples, FL 100 Running7 . 135 - Ricky Stenhouse Olive Branch, MS 100 Running8 . 35 - Cameron Dodson Greenfield, IN 100 Running9 . 92 - Dave Darland Lincoln, IN 100 Running10 . 192 - Levi Jones Olney, IL 100 Running11 . 4 - Eric Gordon Indianapolis, IN 100 Running12 . 198 - Michael Roselli Jr. Brodheadsville, PA 100 Running13 . 110 - Alex Pruett Los Angeles, CA 100 Running14 . 52 - Travis Pastrana Annapolis, MD 100 Running15 . 51 - Russ Gamester Peru, IN 100 Running16 . 5 - Jimmy Kite Stockbridge, GA 100 Running17 . 20 - Ron Gregory Noblesville, IN 99 Running18 . 32 - A. J. Fike Galesburg, IL 77 Accident19 . 1 - Wayne Reutimann Sr. Zephyrhills, FL 67 Mechanical20 . 0 - Wayne Reutimann Jr. Zephyrhills, FL 52 Mechanical21 . 29 - Tony Stewart Columbus, IN 44 Mechanical22 . 25 - Marc Jessup Camby, IN 41 Mechanical23 . 90 - Johnny Heydenreich Bloomsburg, PA 40 Accident24 . 37 - Tracy Hines New Castle, IN 40 Accident25 . 94 - Mike Lichty Ontario, Canada 34 Mechanical26 . 95 - Jerry Coons Jr. Tucson, AZ 26 Accident27 . 89 - Brad Davis Clermont, FL 21 Mechanical28 . 28 - Brian Paulus Mechanicsburg, PA 1 Mechanical

You Can’t Believe Everything You Read
Some times my gut us right and sometimes it is wrong. On Wednesday I reported that Dirt Motorsports would make an announcement regarding title sponsorship in the World of Outlaws. They did name a title sponsor Thursday after noon at PRI but it wasn’t for the World of Outlaws Sprint Series, it was for the World of Outlaws Late Model Series. That series will be called the 360 OTC World of Outlaws Late Model Series. Rockford-Montgomery Labs has signed a three-year deal with Dirt to make their 360 OTC pain reliever brand the title sponsor. There was no announcement today on the WoO Sprint Series, which at this time does not have a title sponsor. I regret the error. I hope you will continue to read this blog knowing that speculation is speculation unless it is confirmed which in this case it was not.

Note: The views and opinions expressed in today’s blog are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of his employers, this website or any other person or company on the planet.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of Open Wheeler.

Dirt Lands Dough

2006-12-13T14:38:00.000-06:00

Dirt Lands Dough

Dirt Motorsports will announce Thursday their title sponsor presumably for their World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series. This will mark the first time since O’Reilly was the title sponsor under the late Ted Johnson’s ownership that the series will have a title sponsor. The word on the street says that the new title sponsor could be Quaker State’s Q brand but we have not confirmed that rumor. The official announcement is set for 3:30pm eastern in the PRI Press Room in Orlando.

The new title sponsor will enjoy the return of the King, Steve Kinser to the series along with Danny Lasoski and other drivers that are expected to follow. The new sponsor will enjoy a stronger television package that includes races on SPEED and for the first time races on ESPN2. Expect more announcements from Dirt Morosports in the upcoming weeks.

All Images Courtesy of Open Wheeler

Mopar Switch-a-roo/ Chevrolet to Tony Stewart/ USAC Rule Changes/ PRA Wraps Up Season/ Striking a Chord/ Truckin News/ Guaranteed Wrecks/ ESPN Racing

2006-12-12T17:39:00.001-06:00

Mopar Switch-a-roo

Mopar is leaving Tony Stewart Racing and will sponsor Kasey Kahne Racing’s efforts in 2007. A news conference is scheduled for Friday at 10am at the PRI show to make the announcement official. Kasey Kahne Racing will field a car with Joey Saldana behind the wheel in the World of Outlaws Sprint Series. Kahne told Dave Moody on Sirius Speedway on Sirius Satellite radio that KKR would also filed sprint and midget cars in USAC in 2007 with Mopar backing. It was unclear listening to the program if Kahne would reopen his Silver Crown program or if the program would run USAC Silver pavement, dirt or PRA pavement. Kahne did tell Moody that he would be spending two weeks in Australia sharing a sprint car ride with Saldana.

Chevrolet Enters USAC Sponsoring Tony Stewart Motorsports
Chevrolet will sponsor and power the engines for Tony Stewart Motorsports in 2007. The three-year deal includes his World of Outlaws team driven by Paul McMahn No. 20, his USAC National Midget Series team driven by Levi Jones driving the No. 20 and Tracy Hines in the No. 21. Jones and Hines will also drive the same numbered cars in the USAC National Sprint Series. The team will also field cars in the USAC Silver Crown Series on dirt. Bass Pro Shops will be an associate sponsor on the USAC cars while remaining the primary sponsor on the WoO car.

"Our goal when we formed Tony Stewart Racing was to create a grassroots motorsports program that would compete for wins and championships while promoting qualified drivers to the next level," said Stewart, who earned his NASCAR success by way of USAC as he captured four USAC national championships, including the elusive Triple Crown in 1995 when he earned titles in each of USAC's top divisions - Sprint, Midget and Silver Crown. "We've been successful, but in order to remain successful we needed a partner committed to us and committed to motorsports. We found the perfect partner in Chevrolet."

Stewart drives Chevrolet powered cars in the NASCAR Nextel Cup and NASCAR Busch Series. Chevrolet's sponsorship of TSR marks its first official foray into USAC and the World of Outlaws. Chevrolet will also provide the "Official Pace Truck of Eldora Speedway." The brand will also be the title sponsor of a major, to be determined auto racing event at Eldora. (Maybe the Four Crown Nationals? Just a guess.) Mark Kent from GM Racing said his company wants to make their mark in grass roots Motorsports.

"Our sponsorship of Tony Stewart Racing ensures Chevrolet's future success in motorsports," said Kent. "We want to establish Chevrolet as the engine of choice for open-wheel racers around the country.

Since its formation in November 2000, TSR has earned seven owner championships. Danny Lasoski WoO 2001
J.J. Yeley USAC National Sprint 2003
Josh Wise USAC National Sprint 2006
(with co-owner Bob East) Won four straight USAC Silver Crown championships from 2002 to 2005 with Yeley, Kasey Kahne and Dave Steele driving.

USAC Rule Changes

With the New Year come new rule changes for USAC midget, sprint and Silver Crown divisions. If a team wants to retain their number from 2006, they must have entered 51% of the races in 2006 in their division. All competitors will be required to wear a head and neck restraint system. The early entry points rule is out the window. The rules for red flags have changed including a new rule that mandates that all drivers remain buckled in on red flags unless a USAC official says otherwise. The Silver Crown division is allowing SB-2 cylinder heads and the weight rules have also changed. The Silver Crown division is also mandating that all drivers become USAC members in order to race.

One way radios are now required in USAC’s sprint divisions. Both sprint and midget divisions have other new rules regarding sail panels and noses of the cars. You can read the new rule changes at USAC’s website, www.USACRacing.com.

PRA Wraps Up Inaugural Season
The Premier Racing Association is wrapping up their inaugural Big Car Series season Wednesday at USA Speedway in Lakeland, Florida. The Big Cars have a scheduled an open practice session today at USA International Speedway. No word yet on how the practice sessions went. The action Wednesday begins with practice at 3pm, qualifying at 5:30pm followed by a scheduled 100-lap feature.

Striking a Chord
I about slit my wrists trying to get through Jay Mohr’s terrible jokes trying to watch the NASCAR Nextel Cup Series Awards Ceremony. If Mohr is banned from Jim Rome’s Jungle, there is a good reason. His jokes are in terrible taste. Thankfully he did not host the NASCAR Busch Series Awards program that was taped in Florida last weekend. The Busch program did have a few bright moments according to Amanda Brahler in her article at http://www.bgnracing.com/. Brahler reports that Open Wheeler Carl Edwards joined recording artists Robert Randolph and The Family Band on guitar. Edwards started his own record label this season, Back 40 Records. Images shot by Phil Cavali of Edwards jam session can be viewed at this link. http://www.bgnracing.com/modules.php?name=BGNPhotos&op=album&id=120&min=32
Unfortunately fans will have to set their VCRs to record the ceremony that airs on TNT on December 19th at midnight eastern. Speed did fans a favor with a better time slot for the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Awards Ceremony. That is scheduled to air on December 29 9pm eastern.

Fike to the Truck Series
According to a story in NASCAR Scene, Aaron Fike will drive the No. 11 Toyota Tundra in the NASCAR Truck Series in 2007.

Schrader Goes Truckin in 2007
Ken Schrader will drive the No. 18 Fastenal Dodge for Bobby Hamilton Racing during the 2007 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series season.

Crocker May Not Run Trucks in 2007
According to a story posted at http://jayski.com/cts/ctsnews.htm, Erin Crocker’s NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series team has closed its operations. Jayski reports that her team members have relocated to other Ray Evernham Motorsports. The article goes on to say that Crocker will run some ARCA ReMax Series races in 2007. The Evernham Motorsports website http://www.evernhammotorsports.com/main.cfm?pagename=standings98&driverId=112
only lists 2006 Busch and ARCA results for Crocker and makes no mention of her 2006 run in the truck series which landed her in 25th in the points, the lowest points finish of any driver to start every race. The second worst finisher points wise that started every race was Kerry Earnhardt. He finished 22nd.

In other related news, Crocker accompanied her boss Ray Evernham to the NASCAR Nextel Cup Awards Ceremony week as seen in these two images. http://www.flickr.com/photos/answer_this/312576279/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/answer_this/311361874/Ray Evernham has repeated told the media that he will not discuss his personal life.

Guaranteed Wrecks

I really doubt that a series that seems to wreck every time they head into turn one on the first lap of a race is ready for this but it appears that the folks at Champ Car World Series would disagree with me. CCWS officials announced that the series would make “standing starts“ (think F1) at venues where it is safe to do so.

Hey folks, this isn’t a good idea unless you want guaranteed carnage. But then again, studies have found that the casual race fan watches the sport for the wrecks.

ESPN Change
I reported earlier this season that ESPN.com created an IRL icon at the top of their page. With the addition of CCWS to their program lineup, that icon has been changed back to “autos.” The NASCAR icon remains unchanged.

ARCA on Speed
SPEED will broadcast 14 ARCA RE/MAX Series races in 2007 beginning Saturday afternoon, February 10 at Daytona Int’l Speedway, with live, flag to flag coverage of the 44th annual Daytona ARCA 200 season opener. In addition to Daytona, events scheduled for coverage in ’07 include both at Toledo Speedway on May 20 and October 14 and both at Pocono Raceway on June 9 and August 4. Kansas Speedway on April 27, Iowa Speedway on June 2, Michigan Int’l Speedway on June 15, Kentucky Speedway on July 13, Nashville Superspeedway on August 11, the Milwaukee Mile on August 26, Gateway Int’l Raceway on August 31, Chicagoland Speedway on September 8 and Talladega Superspeedway on October 5 will complete the coverage.

ESPN Steps Up Busch Coverage

The ESPN family of networks (ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC) will air all of the NASCAR Busch Series races in 2007. The networks will also provide coverage of practice and qualifying from 17 races as well as broadcast the season ending banquet (hopefully at a better time slot than 12am.) The network also plans a pre race program and their news program NASCAR Now. The NASCAR programs will all air in High Definition. Technicians are currently working on HD cameras that will be placed in cars for a totally HD broadcast for the first time.

The ESPN family of networks will go from having only the IRL and NHRA in 2006 to NASCAR, Cup, NASCAR Busch, Champ Car World Series and the World of Outlaws Sprints in addition to the IRL and NHRA. Look for ESPN to utilize some of the new angles and broadcast formats that they used in the IRL broadcast this past season in the NASSCAR broadcasts. The first NASCAR race back on ESPN will be the Busch Series opener on February 17th on ESPN2.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of Open Wheeler, Lonnie Weatley, SPEED, ABC, NBC and NASCAR Images.

Mopar Switch-a-roo/ Chevrolet to Tony Stewart/ USAC Rule Changes/ PRA Wraps Up Season/ Striking a Chord/ Truckin News/ Guaranteed Wrecks/ ESPN Racing

2006-12-12T17:39:00.000-06:00

Mopar Switch-a-roo

Mopar is leaving Tony Stewart Racing and will sponsor Kasey Kahne Racing’s efforts in 2007. A news conference is scheduled for Friday at 10am at the PRI show to make the announcement official. Kasey Kahne Racing will field a car with Joey Saldana behind the wheel in the World of Outlaws Sprint Series. Kahne told Dave Moody on Sirius Speedway on Sirius Satellite radio that KKR would also filed sprint and midget cars in USAC in 2007 with Mopar backing. It was unclear listening to the program if Kahne would reopen his Silver Crown program or if the program would run USAC Silver pavement, dirt or PRA pavement. Kahne did tell Moody that he would be spending two weeks in Australia sharing a sprint car ride with Saldana.

Chevrolet Enters USAC Sponsoring Tony Stewart Motorsports
Chevrolet will sponsor and power the engines for Tony Stewart Motorsports in 2007. The three-year deal includes his World of Outlaws team driven by Paul McMahn No. 20, his USAC National Midget Series team driven by Levi Jones driving the No. 20 and Tracy Hines in the No. 21. Jones and Hines will also drive the same numbered cars in the USAC National Sprint Series. The team will also field cars in the USAC Silver Crown Series on dirt. Bass Pro Shops will be an associate sponsor on the USAC cars while remaining the primary sponsor on the WoO car.

"Our goal when we formed Tony Stewart Racing was to create a grassroots motorsports program that would compete for wins and championships while promoting qualified drivers to the next level," said Stewart, who earned his NASCAR success by way of USAC as he captured four USAC national championships, including the elusive Triple Crown in 1995 when he earned titles in each of USAC's top divisions - Sprint, Midget and Silver Crown. "We've been successful, but in order to remain successful we needed a partner committed to us and committed to motorsports. We found the perfect partner in Chevrolet."

Stewart drives Chevrolet powered cars in the NASCAR Nextel Cup and NASCAR Busch Series. Chevrolet's sponsorship of TSR marks its first official foray into USAC and the World of Outlaws. Chevrolet will also provide the "Official Pace Truck of Eldora Speedway." The brand will also be the title sponsor of a major, to be determined auto racing event at Eldora. (Maybe the Four Crown Nationals? Just a guess.) Mark Kent from GM Racing said his company wants to make their mark in grass roots Motorsports.

"Our sponsorship of Tony Stewart Racing ensures Chevrolet's future success in motorsports," said Kent. "We want to establish Chevrolet as the engine of choice for open-wheel racers around the country.

Since its formation in November 2000, TSR has earned seven owner championships. Danny Lasoski WoO 2001
J.J. Yeley USAC National Sprint 2003
Josh Wise USAC National Sprint 2006
(with co-owner Bob East) Won four straight USAC Silver Crown championships from 2002 to 2005 with Yeley, Kasey Kahne and Dave Steele driving.

USAC Rule Changes

With the New Year come new rule changes for USAC midget, sprint and Silver Crown divisions. If a team wants to retain their number from 2006, they must have entered 51% of the races in 2006 in their division. All competitors will be required to wear a head and neck restraint system. The early entry points rule is out the window. The rules for red flags have changed including a new rule that mandates that all drivers remain buckled in on red flags unless a USAC official says otherwise. The Silver Crown division is allowing SB-2 cylinder heads and the weight rules have also changed. The Silver Crown division is also mandating that all drivers become USAC members in order to race.

One way radios are now required in USAC’s sprint divisions. Both sprint and midget divisions have other new rules regarding sail panels and noses of the cars. You can read the new rule changes at USAC’s website, www.USACRacing.com.

PRA Wraps Up Inaugural Season
The Premier Racing Association is wrapping up their inaugural Big Car Series season Wednesday at USA Speedway in Lakeland, Florida. The Big Cars have a scheduled an open practice session today at USA International Speedway. No word yet on how the practice sessions went. The action Wednesday begins with practice at 3pm, qualifying at 5:30pm followed by a scheduled 100-lap feature.

Striking a Chord
I about slit my wrists trying to get through Jay Mohr’s terrible jokes trying to watch the NASCAR Nextel Cup Series Awards Ceremony. If Mohr is banned from Jim Rome’s Jungle, there is a good reason. His jokes are in terrible taste. Thankfully he did not host the NASCAR Busch Series Awards program that was taped in Florida last weekend. The Busch program did have a few bright moments according to Amanda Brahler in her article at http://www.bgnracing.com/. Brahler reports that Open Wheeler Carl Edwards joined recording artists Robert Randolph and The Family Band on guitar. Edwards started his own record label this season, Back 40 Records. Images shot by Phil Cavali of Edwards jam session can be viewed at this link. http://www.bgnracing.com/modules.php?name=BGNPhotos&op=album&id=120&min=32
Unfortunately fans will have to set their VCRs to record the ceremony that airs on TNT on December 19th at midnight eastern. Speed did fans a favor with a better time slot for the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Awards Ceremony. That is scheduled to air on December 29 9pm eastern.

Fike to the Truck Series
According to a story in NASCAR Scene, Aaron Fike will drive the No. 11 Toyota Tundra in the NASCAR Truck Series in 2007.

Schrader Goes Truckin in 2007
Ken Schrader will drive the No. 18 Fastenal Dodge for Bobby Hamilton Racing during the 2007 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series season.

Crocker May Not Run Trucks in 2007
According to a story posted at http://jayski.com/cts/ctsnews.htm, Erin Crocker’s NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series team has closed its operations. Jayski reports that her team members have relocated to other Ray Evernham Motorsports. The article goes on to say that Crocker will run some ARCA ReMax Series races in 2007. The Evernham Motorsports website http://www.evernhammotorsports.com/main.cfm?pagename=standings98&driverId=112
only lists 2006 Busch and ARCA results for Crocker and makes no mention of her 2006 run in the truck series which landed her in 25th in the points, the lowest points finish of any driver to start every race. The second worst finisher points wise that started every race was Kerry Earnhardt. He finished 22nd.

In other related news, Crocker accompanied her boss Ray Evernham to the NASCAR Nextel Cup Awards Ceremony week as seen in these two images. http://www.flickr.com/photos/answer_this/312576279/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/answer_this/311361874/Ray Evernham has repeatedly told the media that he will not discuss his personal life.

Guaranteed Wrecks

I really doubt that a series that seems to wreck every time they head into turn one on the first lap of a race is ready for this but it appears that the folks at Champ Car World Series would disagree with me. CCWS officials announced that the series would make “standing starts“ (think F1) at venues where it is safe to do so.

Hey folks, this isn’t a good idea unless you want guaranteed carnage. But then again, studies have found that the casual race fan watches the sport for the wrecks.

ESPN Change
I reported earlier this season that ESPN.com created an IRL icon at the top of their page. With the addition of CCWS to their program lineup, that icon has been changed back to “autos.” The NASCAR icon remains unchanged.

ARCA on Speed
SPEED will broadcast 14 ARCA RE/MAX Series races in 2007 beginning Saturday afternoon, February 10 at Daytona Int’l Speedway, with live, flag to flag coverage of the 44th annual Daytona ARCA 200 season opener. In addition to Daytona, events scheduled for coverage in ’07 include both at Toledo Speedway on May 20 and October 14 and both at Pocono Raceway on June 9 and August 4. Kansas Speedway on April 27, Iowa Speedway on June 2, Michigan Int’l Speedway on June 15, Kentucky Speedway on July 13, Nashville Superspeedway on August 11, the Milwaukee Mile on August 26, Gateway Int’l Raceway on August 31, Chicagoland Speedway on September 8 and Talladega Superspeedway on October 5 will complete the coverage.

ESPN Steps Up Busch Coverage

The ESPN family of networks (ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC) will air all of the NASCAR Busch Series races in 2007. The networks will also provide coverage of practice and qualifying from 17 races as well as broadcast the season ending banquet (hopefully at a better time slot than 12am.) The network also plans a pre race program and their news program NASCAR Now. The NASCAR programs will all air in High Definition. Technicians are currently working on HD cameras that will be placed in cars for a totally HD broadcast for the first time.

The ESPN family of networks will go from having only the IRL and NHRA in 2006 to NASCAR, Cup, NASCAR Busch, Champ Car World Series and the World of Outlaws Sprints in addition to the IRL and NHRA. Look for ESPN to utilize some of the new angles and broadcast formats that they used in the IRL broadcast this past season in the NASSCAR broadcasts. The first NASCAR race back on ESPN will be the Busch Series opener on February 17th on ESPN2.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of Open Wheeler, Lonnie Weatley, SPEED, ABC, NBC and NASCAR Images.

Kinser Tells Despain Management Makes the Difference/ Johnson Champion, Kahne and Edwards in the Top 10/ Open Wheelers Take Three of the Top 5

2006-11-19T22:47:00.000-06:00

Kinser Tells Despain New Management Makes the Difference
Following up on a story we first brought you early Saturday, Steve Kinser, a co-owner in the National Sprint Tour, is leaving that series to return to the World of Outlaws in 2007.

Kinser appeared in a taped phone interview on Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain on SPEED Sunday night. He told Despain that he is returning to the WoO because of a change in management from a year ago. Kinser said in the interview that he knows that by leaving, he is loosing his money that he invested in the almost one year old series but he added that he has no regrets. He also talked with Dave Despain about some of the topics we first brought you in our story Saturday. http://openwheeler.blogspot.com/2006/11/breaking-down-kinser-and-lasoski.html The new information from the Wind Tunnel interview was that Steve Kinser Racing is returning to the World of Outlaws because DIRT Motorsports has hired “guys that understand racing and have a love for the sport.”

Just another note on tonight’s Wind Tunnel... The program was a wrap up of the 2006 racing season and included some great and funny highlights.

Oh yea, Robin Miller made his case for Open Wheel racing on it. You can see it when it reairs at 12am and 10am eastern Monday morning. On that same note Racing Incorporated reairs from 3-5pm eastern also on Monday.

Johnson Champion, Kahne and Edwards in the Top 10
Jimmy Johnson didn’t win but he finished good enough Sunday night at Homestead Speedway to win the Nextel Cup. Kasey Kahne started on the pole and had a solid run that saw him finish 4th. Carl Edwards also had a good run finishing 8th. The story wasn’t so pretty for other Open Wheelers.

Robby Gordon got loose and hit the wall in turn 4 on lap 190.

Ryan Newman got together with Juan Pablo Montoya.

Several laps later Newman got back at Montoya sending the NASCAR newcomer for a spin and fiery wreck.

Montoya walked away unhurt and Newman was called to the NASCAR trailer following the race.

JJ Yeley skipped a pit stop to take the lead but ran out of gas with just a few laps to go.

Greg Biffle won the race but Kasey Kahne led the most laps. Jimmy Johnson won the championship while his co-owner Jeff Gordon finished 6th, Kasey Kahne 8th and Tony Stewart beat Carl Edwards by 299 points for 11th place and the million dollar bonus.

Open Wheeler Homestead NASCAR Cup Results
1. (16 Greg Biffle)
4. 9 Kasey Kahne
8. 99 Carl Edwards
15. 20 Tony Stewart
17. 15 Paul Menard
23. 12 Ryan Newman
24. 24 Jeff Gordon
26. 22 Dave Blaney
29. 21 Ken Schrader
30. 18 JJ Yeley
32. 42 Casey Mears
34. 30 Juan Pablo Montoya
39. 49 Mike Bliss
40. 7 Robby Gordon

Open Wheelers Take Three of the Top 5 Positions at Homestead
They didn’t win the race but Carl Edwards, Paul Menard and JJ Yeley all recorded top five finishes in the Busch Series season finale at Homestead. Points leader Kevin Harvick sat on the pole in a race that featured many newcomer Open Wheelers.

Sam Hornish Jr. hit the wall in turn one early in the race.

Jason Leffler was involved in a four car scrum 54 laps into the event. Kevin Harvick officially beat Carl Edwards by 824 points for the championship. JJ Yeley was 5th in season ending points. Paul Menard was 6th. John Andretti won NASCAR Busch Series Rookie of the Year honors.

Open Wheeler Homestead NASCAR Busch Results
1. 17 Matt Kenseth
2. 60 Carl Edwards
3. 11 Paul Menard
5. 18 JJ Yeley
8. 9 Kasey Kahne
12. 99 David Reutiman
14. 42 Juan Pablo Montoya
16. 10 John Andretti
19. 38 Jason Leffler
28. 43 Erin Crocker
43. 39 Sam Hornish Jr.

Images courtesy of SPEED, TNT, NBC and NASCAR Images.

Breaking Down the Kinser and Lasoski Announcements/ Where to Now?/ Homestead Update

2006-11-18T15:55:00.000-06:00

Kiss and Make Up

Typically the news cycle on a Friday afternoon is pretty much dead. That was not the case yesterday as a load of news releases came down the pipe from both Steve Kinser Racing and the World of Outlaws. The main news? The 20 time WoO champ, Steve Kinser and the 2006 National Sprint Tour Champion Danny Lasoski would be returning to the World of Outlaws Sprint Series in 2007. In a year where we lost NST founder Fred Brownfield and WoO founder Ted Johnson, the news was earth shattering.

Why the Return?
So why are the three top teams (Steve Kinser Racing owns two cars) in the National Sprint Tour headed back to the World of Outlaws? Their owners and sponsors appeared to have had a say in the decision. Roth Racing owner Dennis Roth says it is what is best for the sport.

“The best thing for sprint car racing is that the top cars are back together where they belonged from the beginning.”

According to a news release from Steve Kinser Racing, it was Kinser’s sponsor, Quaker State that influenced the King’s decision.

“The World of Outlaws with their new leadership, expanded schedule and new ESPN and SPEED TV deals have really positioned sprint car racing for growth,” said David Lerch, Director of Motorsports for Q. “Steve Kinser, Q and the World of Outlaws belong together and we are pleased to continue our partnership with Steve as he competes for his 21st World of Outlaws title.”

The news releases say that Q renewed their sponsorship with Kinser but do not give details of the sponsorship. There is another reason for the King’s return to the WoO. In a World of Outlaws news release, Steve Kinser said that the late Ted Johnson told Kinser before he died that he would like to see one major 410-winged sprint car series again.

What Will Happen to the NST?

Following the passing of founder Fred Brownfield, the series was purchased by Don Lamberti, Lonnie Parsons, Guy Stockbridge and Steve Kinser. According to a WoO news release Kinser is now out.

“It’s been a hard situation for me to race with all the confusion that’s been going on the last year,” he said. “I just want to get back and relax and worry about my race team more than anything, worry about making my racecars fast and be in the right frame of mind when I hit the racetrack. It’s no fun for me going to the races when I’m worried about scheduling and trying to run a race organization. Now I’ll just have to worry about my two race teams.”

Steve Kinser was unavailable for comment when contacted Saturday. Danny Lasoski indirectly called for the demise of the NST in a WoO news release saying, “I feel we need to be back together as one group under one banner, stronger than ever. The World of Outlaws has done its homework, they got the proper television package with ESPN2 and SPEED and I'm excited to be coming back.”

What About the NST Drivers and the WoO Mean 15?

Already sixteen returning teams have committed to running the full WoO schedule in 2007. So will Roth and Kinser’s teams get tow money? What about the others that may break away from the NST and follow the King? I was unable to immediately reach a spokesperson with the World of Outlaws Saturday. An email requesting comment by the National Sprint Tour had not been returned at the time of the posting of this story. The National Sprint Tour’s website http://www.nationalsprinttour.com/ has not yet posted which drivers would be returning for 2007.

What About the Promoters and the Race Tracks?

The NST website has also not posted a schedule for the 2007 season. In previous seasons Cedar Lake Speedway in New Richmond, Wisconsin has hosted the World of Outlaws on a Monday traditionally following the 4th of July weekend. In 2006 the track elected to bring in the National Sprint Tour in place of the WoO. Cedar Lake Speedway was not listed on the preliminary WoO 2007 schedule. www.dirtmotorsports.com/sprint/downloads/WOOSPRINT2007.pdf/ According to the CLS website, the track will host a 410 sprint car show on July 9th this season but the website does not name the sanctioning organization. The National Sprint Tour has not updated their website since Tuesday November 14th. The website still lists Kinser, Tim Kaeding and Lasoski as NST drivers. Series, teams and sponsors often make their announcements during the Performance Racing Industry show in Orlando. PRI, which is just a few weeks away, should provide more insight. The now defunct National Sprint Car League http://www.nationalsprintcarleague.com/ had an empty booth at the 2006 show indicating that series was no more. Hopefully more positive announcements will be made at the 2007 show.

What is in it for the Fans?

So just what does Friday’s announcements mean for the fans? It means that the level of racing in the World of Outlaws just jumped up a few notches. If other drivers follow Kinser and Lasoski, it means the best drivers in 410 winged sprint car racing will again drive with the World of Outlaws. Having two series competing against each other was good in that it forced both series to become more competitive in all areas from on the track, to working with the promoters, dealing with the fans and in the avenues of media distribution. The National Sprint Tour has NOT announced that it is folding its tent. Regardless of what happens in the next few weeks, the sport of sprint car racing is now better because of the NST.

The full news release from Steve Kinser Racing as well as the WoO releases can be viewed at the bottom of this update.

Two of the Top Three are Open Wheelers
Two of the top three starters for tonight’s NASCAR Busch Series finale are Open Wheelers. Series champion Kevin Harvick is on the pole but JJ Yeley and Carl Edwards will be right on his tale. Yeley qualified second quick while Edwards took third quick. Erin Crocker qualified 21st quick. Crocker’s 43 is wearing Evernham Betty Crocker colors but the car is owned by Mike Curb. Kraig Kinser did not make it in on time.

Open Wheeler Busch Qualifying Results Homestead
1. (21 Kevin Harvick)
2. 18 JJ Yeley
3. Carl Edwards
10. 99 David Reutiman
14. 11 Paul Menard
19. 9 Kasey Kahne
21. 43 Erin Crocker
23. 38 Jason Leffler
24. 39 Sam Hornish Jr.
31. 42 Juan Pablo Montoya
32. 10 John Andretti

Martin Wins Final Truck Race for Roush
Mark Martin won his final NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race driving for Roush Racing last night at Homestead Speedway. Todd Bodine clinched the 2006 Truck Series Championship with his 21st place finish last night. David Reutiman led several laps and finished 8th. Reutiman finished 3rd in points. Terry Cook was 10th. He finished 8th n points. Erin Crocker was out of the race early with ignition problems. She finished the season 25th in points, the lowest points finish of any driver that started all 25 truck races.

Open Wheeler Truck Results Homestead
1. (6 Mark Martin)
8. 17 David Reutiman
10. 10 Terry Cook
16. 21 Bobby East
30. 16 Mike Bliss
34. 98 Erin Crocker

Kahne Will Lead the Field to the Green Sunday
Maybe it was too little too late but regardless Kasey Kahne is on the pole for Sunday’s final Cup race at Homestead. Kahne who is in the Chase but has been mathematically eliminated grabbed the top spot with a time of 178.259mph. JJ Yeley will start 8th. Jimmie Johnson will start 15th and Matt Kenseth 19th. Juan Pablo Montoya will make his first Cup start at 29th in the No. 30 car.

Open Wheeler Cup Qualifying Results Homestead
1. 9 Kasey Kahne
8. 18 J.J. Yeley
12. 24 Jeff Gordon
16. 12 Ryan Newman
17. 49 Mike Bliss
21. 20 Tony Stewart
25. 22 Dave Blaney
28. 15 Paul Menard
29. 30 Juan Pablo Montoya
31. 99 Carl Edwards
35. 7 Robby Gordon
37. 21 Ken Schrader
39. 42 Casey Mears

My Top 25
If you are looking for our My Top 25 feature, you can fin it ion it’s new website at http://www.mytoptwentyfive.blogspot.com/.

Newsreleases on the Kinser/ Lasoski Announcement

Steve Kinser Takes Aim At His 21st World of Outlaws Championship
Concord, NC — Nov. 17, 2006 — By Chris Dolack, VP Public Relations

There is little debate Steve Kinser is the greatest sprint car driver in history. In 2007, Kinser will be aiming to add to his legendary career as he returns to the World of Outlaws and competes for his 21st championship.

One of the original World of Outlaws competitors in 1978, Kinser has earned a series record 533 victories in a racing career that has spanned four decades with the Outlaws. In 2005, he was inducted into the National Sprint Car Hall of Fame.

But Kinser isn’t resting on his laurels. Instead, 2007 will be a bit of a rebirth for him. Not only is he returning to World of Outlaws competition, he also has renewed a deal with long-time partner Quaker State, through its Q brand, to power his Steve Kinser Racing No. 11 Maxim. In addition, his Steve Kinser Racing No. 11k Maxim also will be chasing the World of Outlaws championship.

“I’ve had a good partnership with Quaker State since I started my own race team in 1995,” said Kinser, of Bloomington, Ind. “I hope to continue with them the rest of my racing career and maybe with Steve Kinser Racing after that.”

Ultimately, Kinser’s return to the World of Outlaws brings him back to the series he helped to build and where he experienced his most memorable moments, many of which he shared with series founder Ted Johnson, who passed away in October.

“Ted and I talked quite a bit,” Kinser said. “We talked probably every day, especially since the Knoxville Nationals. Ted’s wishes were to get back together with the World of Outlaws, something he founded and something that, to be honest with you, I was a big part of all my racing career. Me and Rick Ferkel and a lot of guys the first few years spent a lot time at television stations and radio stations trying to build this thing and get it off the ground. I had a good relationship with Ted over the years. We had a working partnership. Over 28 years, Ted and I had a lot of great times together and he was a great friend of mine.”

“We welcome Steve and his return to the World of Outlaws,” said DIRT MotorSports President and CEO Tom Deery. “Not only is he a proven champion, he’s also concerned about what’s best for the future of sprint car racing. We’re excited for our fans that he once again is part of the Greatest Show on Dirt.”

Kinser’s return to the World of Outlaws also has him eager to put his focus back on his two-car team.

“It’s been a hard situation for me to race with all the confusion that’s been going on the last year,” he said. “I just want to get back and relax and worry about my race team more than anything, worry about making my racecars fast and be in the right frame of mind when I hit the racetrack. It’s no fun for me going to the races when I’m worried about scheduling and trying to run a race organization. I will definitely look at the racing part of it a lot different from the way I did before because I’ve been on all ends of it — not that I haven’t been on those sides before, but not to the extent I was last year. Now I’ll just have to worry about my two race teams.”

There is little doubt that Steve Kinser Racing’s return to the World of Outlaws will add to the highly competitive series.

“It’s not going to be easy because there’s a lot of good race teams out there now with a lot of good drivers,” Kinser said. “It’ll be tougher than it’s ever been.”

With two national touring series in 2006, several young teams jumped at the opportunity to race with the World of Outlaws, giving them experience that will no doubt raise the level of competition next year. All of the teams that competed full-time with the series last season already have signed on to compete in 2007.

“That was probably the only good part about having two national organizations,” Kinser said. “It did give a few teams a chance to get out there and get a taste of what was going on out on the road and see what it was like. It can get pretty tough. There are a lot of good race teams on both sides of it and when you put it all back together, it strengthens them. I can remember back when they first started running the Gumout Series. They took some of those drivers and they started winning races. When they came back to the World of Outlaws, they came back with confidence. That means a lot for race teams, when they build that confidence. Sometimes it’s pretty hard to get them beat back down.”

Given the unparalleled competitiveness in the World of Outlaws, Kinser certainly will have his work cut out for him and looks forward to the challenge.

Steve Kinser and Quaker State Return to the World of Outlaws Seeking Record 21st Championship

Q Motor Oil to Help Power Kinser in 2007

Bloomington, Ind., November 17, 2006 — Steve Kinser and Quaker State, through its Q brand, is pleased to announce the relationship will continue in 2007 as Steve Kinser Racing returns to the World of Outlaws.

"The World of Outlaws with their new leadership, expanded schedule and new ESPN and SPEED TV deals have really positioned sprint car racing for growth," said David Lerch, Director of Motorsports for Q. "Steve Kinser, Q and the World of Outlaws belong together and we are pleased to continue our partnership with Steve as he competes for his 21st World of Outlaws title."

Kinser, among the original World of Outlaws drivers when the series began in 1978, owns a record 533 victories and 20 championships. He was enshrined in the National Sprint Car Hall of Fame in 2005. Kinser has been in partnership with Quaker State and Q since forming Steve Kinser Racing in 1995.

“Many things contribute to a winning team, and having Q to help keep our engines running at maximum power under the grueling conditions of sprint car racing will be a tremendous benefit,” said Steve Kinser. “The long-term backing of Quaker State and Maxim Chassis has been a great asset to our team, and we look forward to chasing another World of Outlaws title with them in 2007.”

About Q

Q’s highly-engineered motor oils are designed to provide today’s modern engines with maximum performance and power. Quaker State’s Q line of motor oils features a family of specialty motor oils that have been customized for specific engines and driving needs including: Q Advanced Engine Full Synthetic; Q TorquePower Full Synthetic and three specific Q Racing Oils. These premium-performing lubes cover just about every possible application for the automotive enthusiast.

The Q line of performance products also includes the Q Power System — a unique line of premium engineered coolants and fluids designed to work in combination to fight heat and power-robbing frition to help maximize horsepower. The Q Power System of products consists of Q Advanced Engine Full Synthetic motor oil, Q Quench™ Radiator Additive, Q Coolant/Antifreeze with Quench™, Q Gear & Differential Lubricant SAE 75W-90, and Q Transmission Fluid.

Roth Motorsports Brings Danny Lasoski Back to the World of Outlaws

Concord, NC — Nov. 17, 2006 — By Chris Dolack, VP Public Relations

Danny Lasoski is one of the most successful drivers in World of Outlaws history, and in 2007 he will return to the series as driver of the Roth Motorsports Eagle.

"It's good to be back," said car owner Dennis Roth, a long-time sprint car supporter from California that saw Lasoski compete on 94 nights in 2006 and capture the National Sprint Tour title. "The best thing for sprint car racing is that the top cars are back together where they belonged from the beginning. We had a great year in 2006. The competition in the NST was awfully tough like it is in the World of Outlaws. We were very happy to win the championship."

"Danny raced with us quite a bit last season and we’re pleased he and Dennis have decided to compete for another World of Outlaws championship," said World of Outlaws Sprint Series Director Carlton Reimers. "Dennis Roth is one of the classiest owners in the business and we look forward to seeing him more often in 2007."

The 2001 World of Outlaws champion, Lasoski will seek to add to his total of 74 World of Outlaws victories beginning Feb. 9 at Volusia Speedway Park as the series drops the green flag on its 30th season.

"The competition is going to be the fiercest it has ever been with the World of Outlaws," Roth said. "Two series in 2006 gave some of the new people out there a chance to gain some experience and make the programs and be in the running every night. Now, they're going to be that much better and that much more to contend with. Overall the whole racing program is going to be the best it has ever been."

Last season, Lasoski earned main-event World of Outlaws victories at Manzanita Speedway and Southern Oregon Speedway, as well as a preliminary feature win at Calistoga Speedway. He was excited to be the first driver to commit to the 2007 World of Outlaws championship run following the 16 teams that re-signed after the 2006 season concluded.

"The bottom line is to secure 410 sprint car racing," said Lasoski, of Dover, Mo. "I feel we need to be back together as one group under one banner, stronger than ever. The World of Outlaws has done its homework, they got the proper television package with ESPN2 and SPEED and I'm excited to be coming back. I think really great things are on the horizon and the biggest winner will be the fans."

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of, Open Wheeler, SPEED and NASCAR Images.

Wishful Thinking/ Racing Incorporated Part 2 as Good as Part 1/ SPEED Goes Miami Vice/ USAC Notes

2006-11-17T16:10:00.000-06:00

Wishful Thinking

Don’t expect to find a letter to fans from the IRL and CCWS announcing their reunification under the Christmas tree. We might have taken a tiny step closer late Thursday when ESPN announced a deal with their family of networks and Champ Car World Series. The multiyear agreement will bring 11 Champ Car races to ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC in 2007 and all of the series races to the family of networks in 2008. The move now puts the IRL and CCWS under the same network umbrella which may help move reunification talks along. Maybe my thoughts on reunification are wishful thinking but it is something both series desperately need. CCWS co-owner Kevin Kalkhoven told ESPN.com’s John Oreovicz that the new deal will help the series get in front of the US race fan. Kalkhoven added that the association will be helpful in future moves towards reunification. The he threw SPEED under the transporter.

"If we can't have open-wheel unification, at least we can have a common broadcast partner,” Champ Car co-owner Kevin Kalkhoven told ESPN.com's John Oreovicz. “Speed Channel has become so NASCAR-centric that we were just a speed bump in their day."

The first two races of the 2007 season, Las Vegas and Long Beach will most likely be a time buy on CBS or NBC. The first Champ Car race on the ESPN family of networks will be Houston. The Champ Car Atlantic Series will air on ESPN2. The broadcast schedule has not been announced. The 2007 CCWS event schedule is listed below.

April 8 Las Vegas, Nevada
April 15 Long Beach, California
April 22 Houston, Texas
May 20 Zahuhai, China
June 10 Portland, Oregon
June 24 Cleveland, Ohio
July 1 St. Jovite, Canada
July 8 Toronto, Canada
July 22 Edmonton, Canada
July 29 San Jose, California
August 12 Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin
August 19 Denver, Colorado
October 21 Surfers Paradise, Australia
November 11 Mexico City, Mexico
December 2 Phoenix, Arizona

Racing Incorporated Part 2 as Good as Part 1

If you read the previous blog, you know that I gave Racing Incorporated Part 1 high marks. Part 2 was just as good as or better than part 1.

Part 2 talked about how Chip Ganassi Racing dealt with its rivals. In the IRL, Roger Penske’s teams are CGR’s rivals. The program talked about how both teams battled with each other for the championship.

It also talked about the rivalry between Riley Technologies (also a Silver Crown chassis producer) and CGR.

Ganassi picked Riley Technologies to build a chassis for them that never had been on the track before. In their first year CGR won the championship only to be bested the following year by Riley.

The program also with Target officials on why CGR is a good fit for them.

Target’s Information Technology folks (computer folks) helped CGR build their IT systems and then worked with Microsoft to develop ways for the engineers to use it for all of their race teams but the IRL teams use it the most.

Racing Incorporated focused on the workout programs for the over the wall guys as well as everyone on the team. Engineers do cardio so they won’t get tired in the heat.

CGR had an interesting approach to attracting over the wall guys for their Cup teams. CGR’s over the wall Cup guys were former stick and ball athletes that were recruited to race. They just do pits and a lot of them never knew anything else about racing until they were hired by CGR.

The program closed out with two quotes from Chip Ganassi about goals for his team and organizations.

“We have to win some races and we have to have a car in the chase next year.”

“When people think about racing in the United States I want them to think about our name and our brand and what is that about? It is about Performance, innovation, integrity and it’s about partnership.”

Racing Incorporated is scheduled for rebroadcast on SPEED on Monday November 20th at 3 and 4pm eastern.

SPEED Goes Miami Vice

Last night SPEED’s program The Chase Is On went throwback with a Miami Vice opening complete with boats,

airplanes,

babes and Miami’s skyline.

Carl Edwards co-hosted the program in makeshift shorts.

Final Truck Open Wheeler Practice Results
1. (22) Bill Lester
4. 17 David Reutiman
13. 98 Erin Crocker
19. 16 Mike Bliss
21. 10 Terry Cook
30. 21 Bobby East

Truck Qualifying 5pm Eastern. The race is live tonight on SPEED.

Wind Tunnel, The State of NASCAR

Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain will broadcast a special edition, The State of NASCAR Sunday at 10am eastern. The season finale of Wind Tunnel will air live Sunday night at 9pm eastern. The always loveable Robin Miller will be one of the hosts.

USAC Notes
USAC National Sprint and Midget Car Series driver Bryan Clauson has been nominated for the RACER Magazine Rookie of the Year award. Indianapolis 500 runner-up Marco Andretti (Indy Racing League), Colin Braun (Grand Am), Dan Clarke (Champ Car), Denny Hamlin (NASCAR) and Robert Kubica (Formula 1) are also up for the same award..

USAC will require all drivers to wear a head and neck restraint system in 2007. The new rule covers all regions and divisions. For more more on this story, please visit www.usacracing.com.

Football Coverage
If you are looking for our football features, they can now be found at http://www.mytoptwentyfive.blogspot.com/.

Images courtesy of SPEED, CBS, NBC, IMS Productions, NASCAR Images, Chet Burks Productions, Champ Car World Series, LLC, Riley Scott and USAC.

Open Wheelers Shine in Racing Incorporated

2006-11-16T14:22:00.000-06:00

Open Wheelers Shine in Racing Incorporated

The one hour program Racing Incorporated lived up to it’s billing Wednesday night. The SPEED produced documentary took viewers behind to scenes to see how Chip Ganassi Racing works. Normally these programs are more reality shows than information. That is not the case with Racing Incorporated. The program gives insight to how Chip Ganassi Racing came about and Ganassi’s philosophies on winning.

The program focused on all four of CGR’s teams, IRL, NASCAR Busch, Cup and Grand Am. Racing Incorporated included a compelling interview with Dan Weldon on how not winning the 2006 Indy 500 broke him. At one point Weldon is almost moved to tears.

The program shows all of Ganassi’s wins and his quest for more.

It lays out both the NASCAR and IRL shops in detail explaining how and why they do what they do.

Unless you work in the business, the high flying aircraft in NASCAR and the IRL seems excessive but the program documents why it is a necessity to have a well functioning program.

Chip Ganassi in recent years has hired the best crewmembers and drivers. CGR is also developing drivers for it’s NASCAR programs. The documentary shows the viewers how the Montoya deal went down.

It also shows you how Ganassi is looking to USAC drivers for development of the next generation.

The program follows Bryan Clausen in his development process before his accident. Part 2 of Racing Incorporated will air tonight on SPEED at 8pm and 11pm eastern.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of SPEED.

Wise Officially with Waltrip

2006-11-14T15:25:00.000-06:00

Wise Officially with Waltrip
Back on September 18th we reported that Josh Wise had signed a letter of intent with Michael Waltrip Racing.

The SPEED television program Seven Days featured Wise’s agent Jeff Dickerson. The program followed Dickerson and Wise as he visited with MWR. Monday the USAC standout and MWR made it official just hours after Wise was crowned USAC National Sprint Car Series champion Saturday night in Phoenix.

“Michael Waltrip Racing is proud to be associated with Josh Wise not only for his ability to win championships, but also because of his humble personality,” Waltrip said. “We have already tested Josh in a NASCAR Craftsman Truck a couple of times and have been impressed with his ability to get around the track and provide input to the team.”

Waltrip added that fans can expect to see Josh Wise behind the wheels of NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, ARCA RE/MAX Series and additional entries at short track races.

”It's easy to see why Tony Stewart believes Josh is the next great driver to come through the USAC ranks. We're proud to have a two-time USAC champion in our camp,” said Ty Norris, General Manager for Michael Waltrip Racing.Wise gave honor to his USAC team owner for giving him an opportunity.

“Without Tony, I wouldn’t be where I’m at,” said Wise. “He took a shot in the dark on me. I was living on the West Coast with my parents and racing my family car. I got a call from him out of the blue one day to come out to the Midwest and drive for him. The experience I have gotten and the success that I have had with his team has been huge for me.” Wise will have plenty of experience surrounding him at MWR. In addition to Waltrip, the organization will field two other Cup cars, one for Dale Jarrett and David Reutimann.

“The two tests that I’ve done, David has been a huge help to me,” said Wise. “I can go to him and just ask. I can say to David, ‘I’m doing this and is this right or is this wrong?’ He can send me down the right path. Having each one of them to talk to will be a huge asset for me.”

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of SPEED and NASCAR Images.

USAC Triple Header to Return to Iowa

2006-11-13T22:32:00.000-06:00

USAC Triple Header to Return to Iowa
Iowa Speedway announced today that all three USAC national divisions would compete at the 7/8th mile oval next year on Saturday night May 5th.

That brings the number to four events that have been officially announced for the 2007 Silver Crown Season. Other previously announced USAC Silver Crown dates for 2007 include Richmond International Raceway on June 30th, O’Reilly Raceway Park at Indianapolis on July 26th and Phoenix International Raceway on November 8th.

A complete schedule should be announced sometime in the next month. Iowa Speedway’s full 2007 schedule is listed below:

April 21, Grand AM Cup KONI Challenge Road Course
May 5, USAC Midgets, Sprint cars, and Silver Crown Oval
May 19, ASA Late Model Challenge Oval
May 20, NASCAR Grand National East/West Oval
June 2, Prairie Meadows 250 ARCA RE/MAX Series Oval
June 22, IndyCar practice and IndyPro Series Qualifying Oval
June 23, IndyPro Series Main Event and IndyCar Qualifying Oval
June 24, Iowa Corn Indy 250 IndyCar Series Oval
July 13, MOTO ST Endurance Motorcycle Road race Road Course
July 14, Grand American Rolex Road Racing Series - featuring Daytona Prototype and Grand Touring sports cars Road Course
September 22, USAR Hooters Pro Cup Series Oval

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of Diamond Hope Productions.

Harvick Wins, Gordon and Edwards Duke it Out/ Who Will Win the Cup?/ Montoya at Homestead/ Tough Night for Open Wheelers/ Gordon on MNF

2006-11-12T22:25:00.000-06:00

Harvick Wins, Gordon and Edwards Duke it Out
Kevin Harvick won again in the desert as the racing on the track was hoot for Open Wheelers.

Jeff Gordon started on the pole and held onto the lead before a hot Harvick took the lead 4 laps into the race.

Robby Gordon came down on Chad Chaffin bring out the 4th caution of the day. Mike Bliss brought out the 5th one 35 laps later when his engine expired. With 41 laps to go, this multicar accident in turn one occurred when Jamie McMurray appeared to be turned by Tony Stewart.

The resulting backup sent Ryan Newman spinning. Jamie McMurray’s response to being turned?

“Needless to say, I will by my Irwin Tools at Lowes,” McMurray told an NBC pit reporter.

Edwards got around Gordon for 3rd. Casey Mears spun in some else’s oil bringing out the 10th and final caution.

Gordon got back around Edwards on the restart with a little love tap.

Phoenix Cup Results
1. (29 Kevin Harvick)
4. 24 Jeff Gordon
5. 99 Carl Edwards
7. 9 Kasey Kahne
14. 20 Tony Stewart
15. 12 Ryan Newman
20. 18 JJ Yeley
23. 22 Dave Blaney
24. 21 Ken Schrader
26. 42 Casey Mears
33. 7 Robby Gordon
41. 49 Mike Bliss

Open Wheelers Will Not Win the Cup
Only five drivers have a chance to win the Nextel Cup going into Homestead. None of them are Open Wheelers. Jimmy Johnson leads the points following today’s race at Phoenix. Johnson can win the championship if he finishes 12th or better. Matt Kenseth trails Johnson by 63 points. If the two tie in points, Johnson would win the championship based on most second place finishes. Dale Earnhardt Jr. is in fifth and has to have a lot of things go right to win. He is 115 points out.

Montoya to Make Cup Attempt at Homestead
Miami is his hometown. What better place to make your Cup start than in your hometown? According to an article by David Newton posted at NASCAR.com http://www.nascar.com/2006/news/headlines/cup/11/12/jmontoya.cmears.homestead/index.html Montoya will do just that making his Nextel Cup debut next weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Newton reports that Montoya could drive the No. 30 or maybe even the No. 42 that is normally driven by Casey Mears. Montoya tested at Homestead almost a month ago.

Ganassi on Racing Inc.
On another Ganassi related note, SPEED’s new television program “Racing Incorporated” debuts this Wednesday at 8pm eastern on SPEED. The program follows around Chip Ganassi Racing and shows you what makes the multicar and multiseries tick.

Tough Night for Open Wheelers Friday Night
Johnny Benson won Friday night at Phoenix on an evening that was not kind to Open Wheelers. The best OW finish was delivered by David Reutiman who had to come from the back of the field because of an engine change to finish 8th.

Terry Cook was the looser in a four way battle that saw him go for a spin on lap 105. Four laps later Kraig Kinser and Chad Chaffin got together in turn 2.

Cameron Dodson spun with some help in turn 4 on lap 116.

Open Wheeler Truck Results Phoenix
1. (23 Johnny Benson)
8. 17 David Reutiman
11. 16 Mike Bliss
14. 10 Terry Cook
16. 98 Erin Crocker
18. 21 Bobby East
24. 46 Kraig Kinser
30. 63 Cameron Dodson

Kenseth Wins, Edwards and Yeley 5th and 6th
Phoenix was a little more kind to the Open Wheelers Saturday than it was Friday night. Both Carl Edwards and hometown boy JJ Yeley scored top tens at PIR as Sam Hornish Jr. made his first NASCAR Busch Series start. Paul Menard’s day ended when he made contact with the wall on lap 171. Several laps later Willie Allen got into Stephen Leicht in three. Sam Hornish can’t avoid the mess and his car was done for the day. Juan Montoya tried to avoid the trouble and got into the wall. Montoya would spin again but the track would stay green. On the final restart Matt Kenseth got the jump on Kevin Harvick to get the win.

Busch Series Results Phoenix
1. (17 Matt Kenseth)
5. 60 Carl Edwards
6. 18 JJ Yeley
14. 38 Jason Leffler
20. 42 Juan Montoya
21. 43 PJ Jones
25. 10 John Andretti
30. 9 Erin Crocker
35. 39 Sam Hornish Jr.
37. 11 Paul Menard

Crocker to Double Again
Erin Crocker will again run the Busch race and the Truck race next weekend at Homestead.

Gordon on MNF
The EverSelf Promoting Network will have Jeff Gordon as a guest tomorrow on Monday Night Football in Charlotte. Joe Theismann and Suzy Kolber will go for a ride along. Look for ESPN to roll out a stock car that promotes NASCAR on ABC and ESPN.

ESPN.com Adds IRL
Ok, so the IRL already had a section on www.espn.com but in the past year, the website went from a racing icon on the main page to a NASCAR icon. IRL, CCWS, F1 and the NHRA could also be found under that icon. Now the most popular sports website on the net has added an IRL icon to the front page. All of racing not NASCAR related can now be found under the IRL icon. All of NASCAR’s series can be found under the NASCAR icon. The ESPN has a close relationship with ESPN Sports which broadcasts every race on all three of their networks; ABC, ESPN and ESPN2.

I Can’t Believe It
Sebastian Bourdais won again, this time at the season ending race in Mexico. I know you are shocked that the Frenchman won again but you will have to wait a day or two for a race summery.

All images courtesy of NBC, SPEED and NASCAR Images.

My Top 25

2006-11-12T01:33:00.000-06:00

My Top 25 for Nov. 12, 2006
1. Ohio State 11-0 Beat Northwestern, Illinois, Minnesota, Indiana, Michigan State, Bowling Green, Iowa, Penn State, Cincinatti, Texas and Northern Illinois.
2. Michigan 11-0 Beat Indiana, Ball State, Northwestern, Iowa, Penn State, Michigan State, Minnesota, Wisconsin, held off Vanderbilt and beat Notre Dame and Central Michigan.
3. Rutgers 9-0 Beat Louisville, Uconn, Pittsburgh, Navy, South Florida, Illinois, Ohio and Howard.
4. Boise State 10-0 Beat San Jose State, Beat Fresno State, Idaho, Louisiana Tech, Utah, Hawaii, Oregon State and Wyoming.
5. Arkansas 9-1 Beat UTK, Beat South Carolina, LA Monroe, Ole Miss, Auburn and Alabama. Lost to USC.
6. Notre Dame 9-1 Beat Air Force, Navy, North Carolina, UCLA, Stanford, Purdue, Penn State, Georgia Tech and Michigan State. Lost to Michigan.
7. Louisville 8-1 Lost to Rutgers. Beat West Virginia, Syracuse, Cincinnatti, Kansas State, Miami, MTSU and Kentucky.
8. Florida 9-1 Lost to Auburn. Beat South Carolina, Vanderbilt, Georgia, LSU, Alabama, Kentucky, Central Florida, Southern Miss and UTK.
9. Wisconsin 10-1 Lost to Michigan but beat Penn State, Purdue, Illinois, Minnesota, Northwestern, Indiana, Iowa and San Deigo State.
10. West Virginia 8-1 Lost to Louisville. Beat Cincinatti, U Conn, Syracuse, Mississippi State, East Carolina, Eastern Washington, Maryland and Marshall.
11. USC 8-1 Lost to Oregon State. Beat Oregon, Stanford, Arizona State, Washington, Washington State, Arizona, Nebraska and Arkansas.
12. Wake Forrest 8-1 Beat Florida State, Boston College, North Carolina, NC State, Ole Miss, U Conn and Duke. Lost to Clemson.
13. LSU 8-2 Lost to Florida and Auburn but beat Alabama, Fresno State, Kentucky, Mississippi State, Arizona, Tulane, UTK and Louisiana Lafayette.
14. Georgia Tech 8-2 Lost to Clemson and Notre Dame and beat The Fighting Hurricanes, NC, Maryland, Virginia Tech, NC State and Virginia.
15. Virginia Tech 8-2 Lost to Boston College and Georgia Tech. Beat Kent State, Miami, Clemson, Southern Mississippi, Cincinatti, Duke, North Carolina and Northeastern.
16. Maryland 7-2 Beat Miami, Clemson, Beat Florida State, NC State, Virginia and FIU. Almost upset Georgia Tech.
17. Oklahoma 8-2 Lost to Texas. Beat Texas A&M, Missouri, Colorado, Texas Tech, Iowa State and MTSU.
18. Hawaii 8-2 Beat Louisiana Tech, Utah State, Ohio, Beat New Mexico State, Fresno State, Nevada and Eastern Illinois. Lost to Boise State.
19. Auburn 9-2 Lost to Arkansas and Georgia. Beat Arkansas State, Ole Miss, Florida, South Carolina, LSU, Washington State and Mississippi State.
20. Brigham Young 8-2 Beat Wyoming, Colorado State, Air Force, UNLV, San Deigo State, TCU and Utah State.
21. Texas 9-2 Lost to Ohio State and Kansas State but beat Nebraska, Baylor, Oklahoma, Rice, Oklahoma State, Texas Tech and Iowa State.
22. TCU 7-2 Dropped to Utah and BYU. Beat Wyoming, Army, Texas Tech, UNLV, UC-Davis, New Mexico and Baylor.
23. Boston College 8-2 Lost to Wake Forrest and NC State. Beat Buffalo, Florida State, Virginia, Maine, BYU Duke and narrowly edged Clemson.
24. Cal 8-2 Beat UCLA, Washington, Washington State, Oregon, Oregon State, Arizona State, Minnesota and Portland State but lost to Arizona and UTK.
25. Clemson 8-3 Lost to Maryland and Virginia Tech. Beat NC, Georgia Tech, Temple, Wake Forrest, Louisiana Tech, North Carolina and Florida State.

Knocking on the Door
26. Houston 8-3 Lost to Southern Mississippi and Louisiana Lafayette. Barely lost to Miami. Beat Tulsa, Central Florida, UTEP, SMU, Oklahoma State, and Tulane.
27. UTK 7-3 Beat South Carolina, Alabama, Georgia, Memphis, Air Force, Marshall and Cal but lost to Arkansas, Florida and LSU.
28. Oregon 7-3 Lost to USC, Wasington State and Cal. Beat UCLA, Arizona State, Oklahoma, Fresno State, Portland State, Washington and Stanford.
29. San Jose State 6-3 Lost to Boise State and Nevada. Beat Utah State, San Deigo State, New Mexico State, LA Tech and Cal Poly.
30. Tulsa 7-3 Lost to Houston and Rice but beat UTEP, Memphis, East Carolina, Southern Miss and Navy.
31. Navy 7-3 Lost to Rutgers, Notre Dame and Tulsa. Beat Duke, Air Force, U Mass and U Conn.
32. Nebraska 8-3 Beat Texas A&M, Missouri, Beat Kansas State, Iowa State, Kansas and Troy. Lost to Oklahoma State and Texas.
33. Texas A&M 8-3 Beat Baylor, Oklahoma State, Missouri, Kansas, Louisiana Tech and Louisiana Lafayette but lost to Texas Tech, Nebraska and Oklahoma.
34. Ohio 7-3 Beat Eastern Michigan and Kent State.
35. South Florida 7-3 Beat Syracuse, Pitt, North Carolina, U Conn, Central Florida and FIU. Lost to Kansas and Cincinnatti.
36. Nevada 7-3 Beat Utah State, Idaho, New Mexico State, Colorado State, Northwestern and UNLV.
37. Missouri 7-3 Lost to Nebraska, Oklahoma and Texas A&M. Beat Kansas State, Texas Tech, Colorado, Ohio, New Mexico and Ole Miss.
38. MTSU 7-3 Beat Arkansas State, FAU, LA Layfayette, LA Monroe and North Texas. Lost to Louisville, Oklahoma and Maryland.
39. Central Michigan 7-3 Beat Western Michigan and Temple.
40. Western Michigan 7-3 Lost to Central Michigan and Ohio. Beat Miami od Ohio, Eastern Michigan, Ball State, Northern Illinois and Temple.

Not So Fast!

2006-11-08T23:55:00.000-06:00

Not So Fast!

12. Wisconsin 9-1 at Iowa 6-4
This is Wisconsin’s last tough opponent on their schedule. A win here and they will likely tie for second in the Big 10. Iowa is coming off of choking to Northwestern. Wisconsin by 7 or more.

Georgia 6-4 at 9. Auburn 9-1
Auburn is looking for an SEC and maybe a national title. Georgia has pretty much fumbled their season away since loosing the ball before they got to the endzone early in the season. Auburn wins this one.

18. UTK 7-2 at 6. Arkansas 8-1
This is what college football is all about. Two teams that missed going to bowls last year are now a part of the best teams in the country. Ordinarily this would be a no brainer for the Vols but this one is in Fayetteville, home of the hog trough. (Note: I have always found it ironic that fans and the media traditionally feast on BBQ aka Hog before a home game.) This will be a good game but Arkansas will be the ones feasting when the night is through.

23. Oregon 7-2 at 14. USC 7-1
Oregon is not as good as they once where. USC will not win the National Title. USC will muster enough power to beat the Quack Attack.

1. Louisville 8-0 at 5. Rutgers 8-0
Is the magic still there in the Ville? Or are they drunk with talk about the National Title? Rutgers would be an easy pick but they have won every game so far this season including wins over Navy and Pittsburgh. Could Rutgers do the unthinkable? Run the table and be in the National Championship (NC)? Not So Fast! FOX Sports who have the TV rights to the NC will take a deep sigh of relief when the Cardinals beat the Scarlet Knights on their home turf. It won’t be easy but Louisville is the team to do it.

The phrase “Not So Fast!” is my tribute to Lee Corso of ESPN. It is not intended to infringe on any copyright laws or trademarks.

Look for my rankings Sunday night.

My Top 25 for Nov. 5, 2006

2006-11-05T01:22:00.000-06:00

My Top 25 for Nov. 5, 2006

1. Louisville 8-0 Beat West Virginia, Syracuse, Cincinnatti, Kansas State, Miami, MTSU and Kentucky.
2. Ohio State 10-0 Beat Illinois, Minnesota, Indiana, Michigan State, Bowling Green, Iowa, Penn State, Cincinatti, Texas and Northern Illinois.
3. Michigan 10-0 Almost lost to David Letterman’s Ball State Fighting Cardnals. Beat Northwestern, Iowa, Penn State, Michigan State, Minnesota, Wisconsin, held off Vanderbilt and beat Notre Dame and Central Michigan.
4. Boise State 9-0 Beat Fresno State, Idaho, Louisiana Tech, Utah, Hawaii, Oregon State and Wyoming.
5. Rutgers 8-0 Beat Uconn, Pittsburgh, Navy, South Florida, Illinois, Ohio and Howard.
6. Arkansas 8-1 Beat South Carolina, LA Monroe, Ole Miss, Auburn and Alabama. Lost to USC.
7. Notre Dame 8-1 Beat Navy, North Carolina, UCLA, Stanford, Purdue and Michigan State. Lost to Michigan after beating Penn State and Georgia Tech.
8. Texas 9-1 Lost to Ohio State but beat Nebraska, Baylor, Oklahoma, Rice, Oklahoma State, Texas Tech and Iowa State.
9. Auburn 9-1 Lost to Arkansas. Beat Arkansas State, Ole Miss, Florida, South Carolina, LSU, Washington State and Mississippi State.
10. Florida 8-1 Lost to Auburn. Beat Vanderbilt, Georgia, LSU, Alabama, Kentucky, Central Florida, Southern Miss and UTK.
11. Cal 8-1 Beat UCLA, Washington, Washington State, Oregon, Oregon State, Arizona State, Minnesota and Portland State but lost to UTK.
12. Wisconsin 9-1 Lost to Michigan but beat Penn State, Purdue, Illinois, Minnesota, Northwestern, Indiana, Western Illinois and San Deigo State.
13. West Virginia 7-1 Lost to Louisville. Beat U Conn, Syracuse, Mississippi State, East Carolina, Eastern Washington, Maryland and Marshall.
14. USC 7-1 Lost to Oregon State. Beat Stanford, Arizona State, Washington, Washington State, Arizona, Nebraska and Arkansas.
15. Wake Forrest 8-1 Lost to Clemson. Beat Boston College, North Carolina, NC State, Ole Miss, U Conn and Duke.
16. LSU 7-2 Lost to Florida and Auburn but beat Fresno State, Kentucky, Mississippi State, Arizona, Tulane, UTK and Louisiana Lafayette.17. Georgia Tech 7-2 Lost to Clemson and Notre Dame and beat The Fighting Hurricanes, Maryland, Virginia Tech, NC State and Virginia.
18. UTK 7-2 Beat South Carolina, Alabama, Georgia, Memphis, Air Force, Marshall and Cal but lost to Florida and LSU.
19. Virginia Tech 7-2 Lost to Boston College and Georgia Tech. Beat Miami, Clemson, Southern Mississippi, Cincinatti, Duke, North Carolina and Northeastern.
20. Maryland 6-2 Beat Clemson, Beat Florida State, NC State, Virginia and FIU. Almost upset Georgia Tech.
21. Oklahoma 7-2 Lost to Texas. Beat Texas A&M, Missouri, Colorado, Iowa State and MTSU.
22. Hawaii 7-2 Beat Utah State, Ohio, Beat New Mexico State, Fresno State, Nevada and Eastern Illinois. Lost to Boise State.
23. Oregon 7-2 Lost to Wasington State and Cal. Beat UCLA, Arizona State, Oklahoma, Fresno State, Portland State, Washington and Stanford.
24. Texas A&M 8-2 Beat Baylor, Oklahoma State, Missouri, Kansas, Louisiana Tech and Louisiana Lafayette but lost to Texas Tech and Oklahoma.
25. Brigham Young 7-2 Beat Colorado State, Air Force, UNLV, San Deigo State, TCU and Utah State.

Knocking on the Door
26. Tulsa 7-2 Lost to Houston but beat UTEP, Memphis, East Carolina, Southern Miss and Navy.
27. TCU 6-2 Dropped to Utah and BYU. Beat Wyoming, Army, Texas Tech, UNLV, UC-Davis and Baylor.
28. San Jose State 6-2 Lost to Nevada. Beat Utah State, San Deigo State, New Mexico State, LA Tech and Cal Poly.
29. Boston College 7-2 Lost to Wake Forrest and NC State. Beat Buffalo, Florida State, Virginia, Maine, BYU and narrowly edged Clemson.
30. Western Michigan 7-2 Lost to Ohio. Beat Miami od Ohio, Eastern Michigan, Ball State, Northern Illinois and Temple.
31. Oregon State 6-3 Beat Arizona State and USC.
32. Houston 7-3 Lost to Southern Mississippi and Louisiana Lafayette. Barely lost to Miami. Beat Tulsa, Central Florida, UTEP, Oklahoma State, Tulane and Grambling.
33. Clemson 7-3 Lost to Maryland and Virginia Tech. Beat Georgia Tech, Temple, Wake Forrest, Louisiana Tech, North Carolina and Florida State.
34. Navy 6-3 Lost to Rutgers, Notre Dame and Tulsa. Beat Duke, Air Force, U Mass and U Conn.
35. Nebraska 7-3 Breat Missouri, Beat Kansas State, Iowa State, Kansas and Troy. Lost to Oklahoma State and Texas.
36. Ohio 7-3 Beat Eastern Michigan and Kent State.
37. South Florida 6-3 Beat Pitt, North Carolina, U Conn, Central Florida and FIU. Lost to Kansas and Cincinnatti.
38. Nevada 6-3 Beat Idaho, New Mexico State, Colorado State, Northwestern and UNLV.
39. Missouri 7-3 Lost to Nebraska, Oklahoma and Texas A&M. Beat Kansas State, Texas Tech, Colorado, Ohio, New Mexico and Ole Miss.
40. Pittsburgh 6-3 Lost to South Florida and Rutgers. Beat Central Florida, Syracuse, Toledo and the Citadel.
41. MTSU 6-3 Beat FAU, LA Layfayette, LA Monroe and North Texas. Lost to Louisville, Oklahoma and Maryland.
42. Central Michigan 6-3 Beat Temple.

Congratulations to Donny Schatz/ Juan Pablo Montoya the Student/ CCWS Weekend at Texas/ Shame Shame Everyone Knows Your Name

2006-11-02T11:52:00.000-06:00

Congratulations to Donny Schatz

Congratulations to Donny Schatz, his sponsors and team for winning the 2006 World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series Championship. Schatz, his family and his sponsors have made sacrifices over the years to get to this point. He won the Knoxville Nationals this season and then almost suffered potentially fatal injuries when his sprint car caught fire after an accident in California this season. It has been a long road for Donny Schatz and company. He and his team deserve this championship.

Juan Pablo Montoya the Student

Chip Ganassi Racing has dedicated the rest of Juan Pablo Montoya’s season to learning. That is just what he did Saturday at his first NASCAR Busch Series race at Memphis. Montoya bumped, banged and spun himself and others.

“He did a great job,” said crew chief Brad Parrot. “We adjusted on the car four times, got spun out, come back kind of like Talladega a couple of months ago when we come from the back to the front but we just can't go as far this time. I think we learned a lot, we did a great job.”

In the beginning of the race JPM took his time working with the car, track and other drivers. As the race went on he drove the car a little harder and took more chances. He also tried to show good etiquette, which was not always appreciated.

“Somebody's faster than you, for example, let them through,” said Montoya. “And I did that at the beginning of the race. There are some guys out there that they will race like it was the last lap. You know, he can't really run like that and even one of the guys, you're behind the safety car and they came by and give you the finger, it's like what are you doing, it feels like kindergarten.”

No word on who told Montoya that he was No. 1. He may not be No. 1 right now but chrew chief Brad Parrot says a championship could be in Juan Pablo Montoya’s future.

“I think it's real strange we are not sitting in victory lane right now more to it. You know, it's his first race, you know what I mean. You’ll see this guy as the Nextel champion in the next two years. If Chip Ganassi Racing, if we can step our program more so with him than we are our other drivers and we can do that. This guy can win races, there's to doubt in my mind.”

Montoya’s next goal is a top ten but don’t get him wrong. Winning is still everything to the Colombian.

“If I'm Top 10, yes, it's like a victory. For me, I want to win. As I told you, we have the learning process and everything, but at the end of the day, we're here to win. We're not here to, oh, we finished 10th, he was great, we came back, and we showed we had a car to be further up.”

JPM in Final Three Busch Races

To no one’s surprise, Chip Ganassi announced that Juan Pablo Montoya would race in the final three NASCAR Busch Series races of the season. In other JPM news, Chip Ganassi Racing is going bilingual. The No. 42 team is revamping their website to be read in both Spanish and English. NASCAR’s media website has offered bilingual news for some time now.

More Bilingual News
NASCAR and her new partner ESPN also jumped on bilingual bandwagon. ESPN Deportes Radio and MRN Radio will work together on a two minute segment to air on ESPN Deportes Radio stations in 18 U.S. markets and Sirius Satellite Radio. ESPN Deportes Radio reporter Andrés Agulla covered the Memphis Busch race last weekend.

CCWS Weekend at Texas
Champ Car never raced at Texas due to drivers almost blacking out on the highbanks but this weekend two former CCWS competitors will. Juan Pablo Montoya, No. 42 Texaco/Havoline Dodge and Max Papis, No. 36 Sport Clips Chevrolet competed together in Champ Car during the 2000-01 seasons. The CCWS twosome will be joined by Sam Hornish Jr. in two weeks at Phoenix. Will Sam head in the same direction? Robin Miller thinks so. See his column at SPEEDTV.com.

Open Wheeler Busch Series Entries Texas
9 Kasey Kahne
10 John Andretti
11 Paul Menard
18 JJ Yeley
19 Tony Stewart
36 Max Papis
38 Jason Leffler
42 Juan Pablo Montoya
60 Carl Edwards
99 David Reutiman

Shame Shame Everyone Knows Your Name
It has apparently been done for some time now in NASCAR but Robby Gordon is the first driver to get caught. Gordon was penalized 50 owner and driver points, fined $15,000 and placed on double secret probation Wednesday for intentionally causing a caution at Atlanta Motor Speedway. The money may not matter but the points will. The points portion of the penalty is twice the amount that Dale Earnhardt Jr. was penalized for intentionally spinning himself out last year at Bristol. NASCAR’s point, this throwing debris stuff has to stop. Gordon says he will appeal.

Trucks Entry List Texas
10 Terry Cook
16 Mike Bliss
17 David Reutiman
21 Bobby East
24 AJ Allmendinger
98 Erin Crocker

Racing Round Up Arizona 10 Years
Congratulations to our friends at Racing Round Up Arizona for 10 years in the radio business. The program airs Monday nights on 1310 KXAM in the Phoenix area. RRA has covered everything from the local karting events to the top national events and have given many up and coming drivers their first exposure.

Images appearing in this blog courtesy of Open Wheeler, NASCAR Images and NBC.

Not So Fast!

2006-11-01T23:07:00.000-06:00

Not So Fast!

20 LSU 6-2 at 7 UTK 7-1
LSU must win out if they hope to make it to the SEC Championship game. This is a game where the Vols could fall but Phil Fulmer aka the Great Pumpkin has a strong winning record in November. A loss here could knock either team from the game in the ATL. Vols in a tight one.

12 Tulsa 7-1 at Houston 6-3
Tulsa comes in to this one the best team in C-USA. Houston was the conference favorite. Can the Cougars trump the Hurricanes? Tulsa by 10.

18 Boston College 7-1 at 19 Wake Forrest 7-1
I really haven’t given too much credit to either of these teams this season. BC gets a little bit more of my respect.

25 Oklahoma 6-2 at 16 Texas A&M 8-1
Is Texas A&M for real? Will the Sooners rebound? A&M by 7.

8 Arkansas 7-1 at 22 South Carolina 5-3
Two emotional coaches and teams will battle. SC will put up a good fight but Arkansas will put it together to win.

3 West Virginia 7-0 at 1 Louisville 7-0
This will be one of the biggest games of the season. The winner here will probably represent their conference in the BCS. More importantly it will be critical in the race for the National Championship. Louisville has been ranked No. 1 in my poll for the past few weeks. West Virginia has moved up the ladder winning game after game. They look to fit well into the BCS plans but Not So Fast! I have Louisville No. 1 for a reason. The Cardinals will win in a close one but maintain their top ranked status.

The phrase “Not So Fast!” is my tribute to Lee Corso of ESPN. It is not intended to infringe on any copyright laws or trademarks.

Look for my rankings Sunday night.

Stewart Wins Atlanta/ Harvick Sneeks Under Edwards/ Open Wheelers Shine in Trucks/ Walker and Crocker News/ Stewart Scores Another Championship

2006-10-30T00:24:00.000-06:00

Tony Stewart wins Atlanta
Tony Stewart recorded his 28th NASCAR Nextel Cup Series victory Sunday at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Jeff Gordon got together with Jamie McMurray in turn 2 when McMurray could “see Gordon because of the sun.” Ryan Newman ran into trouble on the backstretch on lap 244.

Kasey Kahne got into David Stremme on lap 250 in turn 1. Tony Stewart who led the most laps of the race, 146,

retook the lead from Dale Earnhardt on lap 315 and held on for the next ten laps for the win.

Cup Results Atlanta
1. 20 Tony Stewart
6. 24 Jeff Gordon
7. 99 Carl Edwards
10. 7 Robby Gordon
16. 18 JJ Yeley
18. 22 Dave Blaney
24. 21 Ken Schrader
29. 49 Mike Bliss
28. 42 Casey Mears
30. 12 Ryan Newman
38. 9 Kasey Kahne

Harvick Sneeks Under Edwards to Win in Memphis

MILLINGTON, Tenn. – Kevin Harvick and his No. 21 Coast Guard team have dominated all season and Saturday at Memphis was no different. As I correctly predicted on Friday, Harvick won clinching the owner’s points championship for Richard Childress Racing. Kevin Harvick clinched the drivers points championship two weeks ago at Charlotte. It was not an easy road for the 2006 champ or three other Open Wheelers Kasey Kahne, JJ Yeley and Carl Edwards. The drivers were all on Atlanta at Cup Happy Hour when their fill in drivers like USAC driver Pete Shepherd qualified their cars. Because of the change, all were forced to start from the rear. Pole sitter Johnny Sauter would lead the field to the green flag before a sellout crown of 38,000. A track record tying 15 cautions would fly on the afternoon.

The first, coming for a spin by Burney Lamar when Kasey Kahne helped Lamar around in turn 4 on lap 46. On lap 83, Clint Bowyer took the lead from Sauter. The two would trade places before Kenny Wallace took the lead on lap 144.

JJ Yeley was helped around by Juan Montoya on lap 148 in turn 4.

Juan Pablo Montoya went around with a little help from Jason Keller in turn 2 on lap 156. Montoya raced Keller hard in practice Friday. Kevin Harvick would take over the lead on lap 160.

John Andretti had a brief fire on a pit stop but would make it back onto the track. Burney Lamar went around again thanks to the help of Augie Vidovich on lap 179 in turn 1. Lamar’s day was over in his last race for Kevin Harvick Incorporated. Carl Edwards would nose under Harvick on a restart on lap 238.

It looked like Edwards would get his first win at Memphis Motorsports Park but the yellow flag flew for an accident involving Steven Wallace with four laps to go. NASCAR went to overtime with a “green-white-checker” restart and both Kevin Harvick and Clint Bowyer were able to get around the Silver Crown team owner.

Harvick held off his teammate for the win. With the win, Harvick became the first Busch Series driver to win two races at the ¾ mile paved oval. The third place finish kept Carl Edwards second in the points, Yeley is 5th and Paul Menard is 6th.

Busch Series Results Memphis
1. (21 Kevin Harvick)
3. 60 Carl Edwards
8. 9 Kasey Kahne
10. 18 J.J. Yeley
11. 42 Juan Pablo Montoya
23. 11 Paul Menard
34. 38 Jason Leffler
35. 10 John Andretti
38. 77 Burney Lamar

Open Wheelers Shine at Atlanta
Former USAC driver Mike Bliss recorded his first NASCAR win since 2002 Saturday at Atlanta Motor Speedway as other Open Wheelers shined. The other story of the day would be 21 lead changes amoung 9 drivers. Mike Skinner took the lead when the green flag dropped but newcomer AJ Allmendinger got his first chance to lead a NASCAR race on lap 8. Johnny Benson took the lead away from Allmendinger on lap 13. The former Champ Car World Series driver and Joe Nemecheck were then involved in a two car accident on lap 14 on the backstretch. David Reutiman took the lead from Benson on lap 28. Mike Bliss took the lead on lap 34. Reutiman took the lead back on the next lap and led until Johnny Benson took the point on lap 48. Mike Bliss led for the second time of the day on lap 53. Jack Sprague took the lead on lap 80 and Reutiman took it away 4 laps later. Other drivers would take the lead but Reutiman would get it back on lap 102. Bobby Hamilton Jr. would trade the lead with Reutiman several times before Erik Darnell would take the point on lap 114. Mike Bliss would take the lead for the final time with 9 laps to go and would hold on for the win on the 1.54 mile banked track. The day was also good for Terry Cook and David Reutiman who both scored top five finishes.

Open Wheeler Truck Results Hotlanta
1. 16 Mike Bliss
2. 10 Terry Cook
4. 17 David Reutiman
15. 21 Bobby East
23. 98 Erin Crocker
34. 24 AJ Allmendinger

Walker to Trucks
Tyler Walker will drive for Bill Davis Racing in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series in 2007 Walker will drive the No. 36 Toyota Tundra.

Also SPEED’s Ray Dunlap is reporting that Erin Crocker will have a new crew chief come next weekend.

Tony Stewart Racks Up Another Championship
Tony Stewart added to his long list of championships Saturday as he won his first IROC championship finishing third at Atlanta Motor Speedway. Fellow Open Wheeler Ryan Newman was fourth. Stewart has national championships in six different series including the USAC Triple Crown in 1995.

USAC Midget 1994, 1995
USAC Sprint 1995
USAC Silver Crown 1995
IRL IndyCar 1997
NASCAR Nextel Cup 2002, 2005
IROC 2006

Coming Later this Week:
More with Juan Montoya and Schatz on Wind Tunnel

All images in this update courtesy of NBC, NASCAR Images and SPEED.

My Top 25

2006-10-29T17:12:00.000-06:00

My Top 25 for Oct. 29, 2006

1. Louisville 7-0 Beat Syracuse, Cincinnatti, Kansas State, Miami, MTSU and Kentucky.
2. Ohio State 9-0 Beat Minnesota, Indiana, Michigan State, Bowling Green, Iowa, Penn State, Cincinatti, Texas and Northern Illinois.
3. West Virginia 7-0 Beat U Conn, Syracuse, Mississippi State, East Carolina, Eastern Washington, Maryland and Marshall.
4. Michigan 9-0 Beat Northwestern, Iowa, Penn State, Michigan State, Minnesota, Wisconsin, held off Vanderbilt and beat Notre Dame and Central Michigan.
5. Boise State 8-0 Beat Idaho, Louisiana Tech, Utah, Hawaii, Oregon State and Wyoming.
6. Rutgers 7-0 Game On Sunday Beat Pittsburgh, Navy, South Florida, Illinois, Ohio and Howard.
7. UTK 7-1 Beat South Carolina, Alabama, Georgia, Memphis, Air Force, Marshall and Cal but lost to Florida.
8. Arkansas 7-1 Beat LA Monroe, Ole Miss, Auburn and Alabama. Lost to USC.
9. Notre Dame 7-1 Beat Navy, UCLA, Stanford, Purdue and Michigan State. Lost to Michigan after beating Penn State and Georgia Tech.
10. Texas 8-1 Lost to Ohio State but beat Nebraska, Baylor, Oklahoma, Rice, Texas Tech and Iowa State.
11. Auburn 8-1 Lost to Arkansas. Beat Ole Miss, Florida, South Carolina, LSU, Washington State and Mississippi State.
12. Tulsa 7-1 Beat UTEP, Memphis, East Carolina, Southern Miss and Navy.
13. Cal 7-1 Beat Washington in OT Beat Washington State, Oregon, Oregon State, Arizona State, Minnesota and Portland State but lost to UTK.
14. Florida 7-1 Lost to Auburn. Beat Georgia, LSU, Alabama, Kentucky, Central Florida, Southern Miss and UTK.
15. Wisconsin 7-1 Lost to Michigan but beat Purdue, Illinois, Minnesota, Northwestern, Indiana, Western Illinois and San Deigo State.
16. Texas A&M 8-1 Beat Baylor, Oklahoma State, Missouri, Kansas, Louisiana Tech and Louisiana Lafayette but lost to Texas Tech.
17. USC 6-1 Lost to Oregon State. Beat Arizona State, Washington, Washington State, Arizona, Nebraska and Arkansas.
18. Boston College 7-1 Lost to NC State. Beat Buffalo, Florida State, Virginia, Maine, BYU and narrowly edged Clemson.
19. Wake Forrest 7-1 Lost to Clemson. Beat North Carolina, NC State, Ole Miss, U Conn and Duke.
20. LSU 6-2 Lost to Florida and Auburn but beat Fresno State, Kentucky, Mississippi State, Arizona, Tulane and Louisiana Lafayette.
21. Georgia Tech 6-2 Lost to Clemson and Notre Dame and beat The Fighting Hurricanes, Maryland, Virginia Tech and Virginia.
22. South Carolina 5-3 Beat Vanderbilt, Kentucky and FAU. Lost to Auburn and UTK.
23. Virginia Tech 6-2 Lost to Boston College and Georgia Tech. Beat Clemson, Southern Mississippi, Cincinatti, Duke, North Carolina and Northeastern.
24. Maryland 6-2 Beat Florida State, NC State, Virginia and FIU. Almost upset Georgia Tech.
25. Oklahoma 6-2 Lost to Texas. Beat Missouri, Colorado, Iowa State and MTSU.

Knocking on the Door
26. Oregon 6-2 Lost to Washington State and Cal. Beat UCLA, Arizona State, Oklahoma, Fresno State, Portland State and Stanford.
27. Clemson 7-2 Lost to Virginia Tech. Beat Georgia Tech, Temple, Wake Forrest, Louisiana Tech, North Carolina and Florida State.
28. Hawaii 6-2 Beat Ohio, Beat New Mexico State, Fresno State, Nevada and Eastern Illinois. Lost to Boise State.
29. Missouri 7-2 Lost to Oklahoma and Texas A&M. Beat Kansas State, Texas Tech, Colorado, Ohio, New Mexico and Ole Miss.
30. Pittsburgh 6-2 Lost to Rutgers. Beat Central Florida, Syracuse, Toledo and the Citadel.
31. Brigham Young 6-2 Beat Air Force, UNLV, San Deigo State, TCU and Utah State.
32. Kent State 4-2 Beat Toledo, Temple, Akron and Bowling Green.
33. TCU 5-2 Dropped to Utah and BYU. Beat Wyoming, Army, Texas Tech, UC-Davis and Baylor.
34. San Jose State 5-2 Lost to Nevada. Beat Utah State, San Deigo State, LA Tech and Cal Poly.
35. Western Michigan 6-2 Lost to Ohio. Beat Eastern Michigan, Ball State, Northern Illinois and Temple.
36. Oregon State 6-3 Beat USC.
37. Alabama 6-3 Lost to UTK, Lost to Florida and Arkansas. Beat Ole Miss, Duke, Vanderbilt, Hawaii and Louisiana Monroe.
38. Iowa 6-3 Lost to Michigan, Indiana and Ohio State. Beat No. Ill., Purdue, Illinois, Iowa State, Syracuse and Montana.
39. Houston 6-3 Lost to Southern Mississippi and Louisiana Lafayette. Barely lost to Miami. Beat Central Florida, UTEP, Oklahoma State, Tulane and Grambling.
40. Washington State 6-3 Lost to Cal and USC. Beat UCLA, Stanford and Oregon State
41. Arizona State 5-3 Lost to USC, Oregon and Cal but beat Stanford, Washington, Colorado and Nevada.
42. Penn State 6-3 Beat Purdue, Illinois, Minnesota and Northwestern. Lost to Ohio State and Michigan.
43. Navy 5-3 Lost to Rutgers, Notre Dame and Tulsa. Beat Air Force, U Mass and U Conn.
44. Georgia 6-3 Lost to Florida, Vanderbilt and UTK. Beat Mississippi State, Ole Miss, Colorado, UAB, South Carolina and Western Kentucky.
45. Oklahoma State 5-3 Lost to Texas A&M, Kansas State and Houston. Beat Nebraska, Arkansas State and Kansas.
46. Arkansas State 5-3 Beat North Texas, Memphis, Louisiana Monroe, Army and FIU. Lost to SMU, FAU and Oklahoma State.
47. Nebraska 6-3 Lost to Oklahoma State and Texas. Beat Kansas State, Iowa State, Kansas and Troy.
48. Ohio 6-3 Beat Kent State.
49. South Florida 5-3 Beat North Carolina, U Conn, Central Florida and FIU. Lost to Kansas and Cincinnatti.
50. Nevada 5-3 Beat News Mexico State, Colorado State, Northwestern and UNLV.

Sauters Rule while Juan and Leffler Run Up Front/ Juan Pablo Montoya Happy with Sessions/ Tracy Stays in Champ/ If Stewart Wins, Eldora May Get IROC

2006-10-27T20:16:00.000-05:00

Sauters Rule while Juan and Leffler Run Up Front
MILLINGTON, Tenn. - The Sauter brothers shined today at Memphis Motorsports Park despite the clouds and intermittent rain. Johnny Sauter let the first practice session. His brother Jay led the final session turning the best time of the day at 22.919 at 117.806mph. Juan Pablo Montoya and his No. 42 team were hot right out of the box today timing in 4th quick in the first practice session of the day at 23.136. Carl Edwards was 6th quick in the session coming in at 23.169. Jason Leffler was 9th quick at 23.214. The USAC Silver Crown owner was second quick in the final practice turning a time of 22.942. JPM timed in 8th at 23.054. Burney Lamar was 10th quick at 23.083. Rain halted practice today several times as four jet driers circled the track. There were no major incidents. The weather should be perfect for tomorrow’s race. By the way, I am predicting Kevin Harvick to win.

Juan Pablo Montoya Happy with Sessions
NASCAR Busch Series rookie Juan Pablo Montoya says everything is going well. The Open Wheeler spoke to the national and local media today following practice at MMP. Montoya’s crew chief and former Busch crew chief for Carl Edwards, Brad Parrott said the rookie is doing a 11 out of 10 for his first time on the track. JPM was fast all day. Parrott says the real test will come with the other cars on the track racing his NASCAR newcomer.

Not so Hotlanta
Rain washed out qualifying today at Atlanta Motor Speedway. The start of Sunday’s race will be set by points. Matt Kenseth is on the pole and Open Wheeler Kasey Kahne will start 8th. Carl Edwards and the rest of the Cup guys minus Kahne, who are scheduled to race in Memphis on Saturday, flew in to the Memphis Motorsports Park today to practice. You can track their flights in the links posted yesterday on this website.

Newman Wins PRA Race
Cup driver Ryan Newman took the lead from Marc Jessup three-quarters of the way through the 100 lap event and went on to record the win. Newman and Jessup staged a thrilling duel, swapping the lead several times for two laps, before Ryan took command. Jessup would go on to finish 14th. A.J. Fike held off PRA points leader Chet Fillip for second position, while Tracy Hines and Eric Gordon rounded out the top five finishers. Next up for the Big Cars will be at USA International Speedway in Lakeland, Florida December 13th.

Tracy Stays in Champ

Paul Tracy abandoned the path that his teammate AJ Allmendinger has taken. The Canadian has announced that he will not race in NASCAR next season and instead concentrate on winning in the Champ Car World Series. Allemdinger is on the fast track to NASCAR.

If Stewart Wins, Eldora May Get IROC
Tony Stewart has said in the media before that if he wins the 2006 IROC title that he is willing to forfeit the million dollar prize in exchange for getting Eldora Speedway to host an IROC event, in late model cars, in 2007. Stewart will need to finish third or better to clinch the title. Stewart was the IROC Series runner-up in 2001. A Crown Royal IROC title in 2006 would give Stewart six different series title to his collection of national championships. His five national titles include: USAC National Midget champion (1994 & ’95), USAC Sprint Car (’95), USAC Silver Crown (’95), IRL IndyCar Series (’97) and NASCAR Nextel Cup (2002 & ’05). Stewart, Matt Kenseth, Max Papis and Ryan Newman all mathematically have a chance at the title in Atlanta Saturday on SPEED at 3pm eastern. Open Wheelers Sam Hornish Jr., Scott Sharp, and Steve Kinser are also scheduled to start.

Kinser began the 2006 season at Daytona with this scary flip

and followed it up

with this flip at Texas.

All images in this update courtesy of CCWS and SPEED.

Memphis Open Wheeler Busch Series Coverage/ Pete Shepherd and Bobby East News/ Montoya Mania/ Rice to Champ Car?/ NASCAR Comes to ESPN2

2006-10-26T13:08:00.000-05:00

Memphis Open Wheeler Busch Series Coverage
Welcome to our coverage of this weekend’s NASCAR Busch Series race at Memphis Motorsports Park. We have a lot of stories we are working on plus information on our Open Wheelers racing in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race at Atlanta so lets get to it.

Memphis Motorsports Park (MMP) is known as a good place for first time Busch Series drivers to get their first start. The track’s first race came in 1999 and since then 23 drivers have made their series debut at the .75- mile facility. Many Open Wheelers have gotten their first start at Memphis.

The Great Racing Fly In
One of the reasons Memphis is a great place for first times is that the Cup guys are in Atlanta but that doesn’t mean we will not see them in the Bluff City this weekend. Three Chase contenders are schedule to make the flight from Atlanta, Georgia to Millington, Tennessee. Kyle Busch was originally scheduled to race in Memphis but has since backed out and who can blame him with so much at state in Hotlanta. Kevin Harvick clinched the Busch Series championship two weeks ago at Charlotte but will still race in Memphis. Harvick told Dave Rodman of NASCAR.com that he has always planned on racing at MMP and his plans have never changed. Denny Hamlin and Open Wheeler Kasey Kahne are the other two “Chasers” making the trip. Open Wheelers JJ Yeley and Carl Edwards will also pull the double. Cup Happy Hour is scheduled for 12:50pm eastern in Atlanta and the start of the Busch Race at MMP is set for 2:10 eastern. This makes for a tight day logistically. The teams work with Memphis Motorsports Park and local authorities to pull off the quick trip. Last year Edwards hopped a ride with his boss Jack Roush to Charles Baker Airport, which is located adjacent to MMP property. Other teams with bigger aircraft have to land at Millington Municipal Airport, which is located a few miles north of the track. Several teams have already landed at the larger Millington airport this morning. You can track the flights to Millington http://flightaware.com/live/airport/KNQA as well as Charles Baker http://flightaware.com/live/airport/2M8 through our friends at FlightAware.com.

Shepherd to Warm Up Busch Car for Edwards
Roush Racing developmental driver, Peter Shepherd, will practice and qualify Carl Edwards' Busch Series No. 60 FreeCreditReport.com Ford Fusion this weekend in Memphis. This will be Shepherd's inaugural Busch Series event. Shepherd has competed in three NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series races this season for Roush Racing, the first of which was at Memphis. Shepherd qualified 25th and finished 23rd in that race. Carl Edwards is part owner of the USAC Silver Crown race car that Shepherd competed in this year and has helped Shepherd out with driving tips throughout the season. Now Shepherd can return the favor while gaining valuable seat time. With Edwards in Atlanta for the Nextel Cup race he will miss all Busch practice sessions and qualifying for Saturday's Sam's Town 250. Shepherd will step in to practice and qualify the car while Edwards fulfills his Nextel Cup responsibilities in the No. 99 Office Depot Ford Fusion at Atlanta Motor Speedway. Shepherd is prepared to start the Busch race if Edwards does not make it to Memphis in time for the green flag."I am really thrilled for this opportunity," Shepherd said. "Pierre Kuettel (P.K.) and the whole No. 60 team are great at what they do and I can't wait to help out and learn at the same time. I hope we can get the No. 60 FreeCreditReport.com Ford Fusion handling just right so Carl can jump in and win the race." Edwards who is second in Busch Series points, said he had confidence in Shepherd's ability to perform."Peter has been doing a great job driving," Edwards said. "He finished the season driving my RE Technologies Silver Crown USAC Car, and I got a chance to spot for him in Chicago and was really impressed with him, just like everyone else. He is a super nice kid; he has a great family and will be a great driver. Peter has tested the Silver Crown car at Memphis and ran the truck there so we thought he would be the perfect guy to get the car set up and ready to race."

Montoya Mania
The big news this weekend in Memphis, never mind the outcome, will be Juan Pablo Montoya first NASCAR star in the No. 42 Texaco/Havoline Dodge. The former Indianapolis 500 champion and Formula One star has participated in several tests in NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series cars including one two weeks ago at Memphis Motorsports Park. JPM has also made starts at Talladega Superspeedway and at Iowa Speedway in the ARCA RE/MAX Series. The Columbian will take over the driving duties of the No. 42 Texaco/Havoline Dodge in the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series in 2007. The 31-year-old driver is probably one of the best Open Wheel drivers in the world. In 137 starts between the CART, IndyCar and Formula One Series, Montoya has tallied 18 wins, 26 poles, 60 top-five and 79 top-10 finishes.

“Our biggest goal this weekend is to get 250 laps of racing,” said crew chief Brad Parrott. “He got 202 at Iowa on the short track, now we need to get 250. He needs to continue to get more comfortable racing in traffic and that comes with race time and laps. He had a good test in the Cup car at Memphis, and the Texaco/Havoline team put together a good car, so this should be a good weekend for the team and the organization.”

Juan Pablo Montoya is aware of the goals but knows Memphis will not be an easy race.

“Memphis is a really tough race track. When I tested the Cup car there the first thing I learned was that it is a really small racetrack. It is difficult and tricky. I was surprised at how hard on the tires it was, it killed the tires. When I race at Iowa there were several lines you could run, at Memphis there is really just one line. Everybody wants to run the car at the bottom, that's it. When we tested, I was running competitive times with (David) Stremme, so I think my race pace is fine. I do think there will be a lot of getting bumped and moved around. It's going to be I think a bit of a shock for me compared to what I’ve been used to in Formula One. I'm out here to learn and get ready to take over the Texaco/Havoline car in 2007. Hopefully, we can bring this car home in better shape than the car from Iowa.”

Burney’s Back
Open Wheeler Burney Lamar is back behind the wheel of the No. 77 Dollar General Chevrolet this weekend. Tennessee based Dollar General is hoping to provide a lucky boost for the team by inviting the Kevin Harvick Inc. road and race day crews to join a riverboat cruise on the Mississippi River aboard the Queen Memphis III on Thursday evening. Note to KHI team, bring a jacket because the river can get cool on fall evenings.

Leffler Looks for Win
Open Wheeler Jason Leffer cut his teeth on short tracks. Maybe that is why he is looking forward to Memphis. Leffler who currently sits 11th in the NASCAR Busch Series point standings has a total of five career starts at Memphis Motorsports Park, three (3) in the NASCAR Busch Series and two (2)in the Craftsman Truck Series. The USAC Silver Crown Series Championship Car Owner has one career pole, one top-five and two top-10 finishes with eleven laps led at MMP.

Memphis Notes
There have been seven different winners at Memphis since the inaugural NASCAR Busch Series race at the track in 1999. Two former winners – teammates Clint Bowyer (2005) and Kevin Harvick (2000) – are entered. Randy LaJoie, who will sub for Harvick until race time, also won at Memphis in 2001. Harvick and Bowyer have two top-five finishes at Memphis, best among drivers entered. Jason Keller has five top-10 finishes at Memphis, best among all drivers. A new Busch Pole winner can emerge from Memphis as none of the previous four pole winners are entered in the event. Jeff Green and Martin Truex Jr. lead that category with two each. Four former Memphis winners also are NASCAR Busch Series champions – Harvick, Truex, Jeff Green and LaJoie.

Richard Childress can clinch his third NASCAR Busch Series owner championship at Memphis if Kevin Harvick driving the No. 21 U.S. Coast Guard Chevrolet can finish 35th or better. Harvick is not taking any chances, bringing the same car that won earlier this year at Martinsville Speedway, O’Reilly Raceway Park and Richmond International Raceway. Paul Menard will aim for his 100th series start at Memphis.

Schedule: All times central
Friday, Oct. 27
Practice, 2-3 p.m. & 4-5 p.m.
Rookie Practice, 3:30-4 p.m.
Saturday, Oct. 28
Qualifying, 10:05 a.m.
Race, 1:10 p.m. NBC

Odds and Ends Track Layout: .75-mile oval Race Purse: $1,279,397 2005 Winner: Clint Bowyer 2005 Pole: Martin Truex Jr.

Out numbered?
Out of 50 entries this weekend, 8 are Open Wheelers

Busch Series Entries for Memphis
9 Kasey Kahne
10 John Andretti
11 Paul Menard
18 J.J. Yeley
38 Jason Leffler
42 Juan Pablo Montoya
60 Carl Edwards
77 Burney Lamar

Tickets Almost Gone
If you are planning on going to the Memphis race this weekend and haven’t purchased your tickets yet you better get on the phone. As of last check, all that remains are $45 general admission tickets ($20 for children under 12) in Grandstand H – the new, temporary stands brought in to accommodate the continuing demand for tickets to the track’s NASCAR season finale on Oct. 28. Also available are $15 tickets for the three practice sessions on Friday, Oct. 27. For tickets or more information, call 1-866-40-SPEED (77333) or visit MemphisMotorsportsPark.com.

We will have continuing coverage throughout the weekend of the Memphis Busch race on this website.

Bobby East Looks for First Win in Hotlanta
Memphis is not the only place that Open Wheelers are looking for success this weekend. Bobby East and five other Open Wheelers are looking for good results at Atlanta Motor Speedway. East returns to the site of his 2006 Craftsman Truck Series debut where he started fifth and finished 23rd in the spring race at AMS.

“I've really learned a lot on our mile-and-a-half program,” said East. “When we went to Atlanta earlier this year, we had a fast truck and we had an excellent setup and a good body and an awesome motor, but it was my first mile-and-a-half race and I really didn't know what to do other than hold the throttle down. I took that race and made sure I finished every single lap just to make sure I could get 130 laps of experience on a mile-and-a-half track. Since that time, we've come a long way. The team has come a long way in its mile-and-a-half program, and they've really worked hard with me to get better on the mile-and-a-halfs because that's been one of my biggest struggles this year. We're trying to get top-10s. We've had some decent runs here lately; we either haven't been able to finish it or had some kind of problems along the way. We're just making sure we work through everything we can, but when we show up to the track, me and John Monsam (crew chief), our mindset is: what can we do to get a top-10? That's what I want, to be able to put myself in the position where I'm in the top 10 week in and week out and see if we can't turn our luck around here ourselves.”

Open Wheeler Truck Entries for Hotlanta
10 Terry Cook
16 Mike Bliss
17 David Reutiman
21 Bobby East
24 AJ Allmendinger
98 Erin Crocker

SPEED Says Rice to CCWS
According to a story posted at http://www.speedtv.com/articles/auto/champcar/33628/ Buddy Rice could leave the IRL for Champ Car in 2007. SPEED reports that Rice will replace A.J. Allmendinger in the CCWS season finale Nov. 12 at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez. Allmendinger announced earlier this week he was leaving Champ Car for NASCAR..

Who is Next?
Today’s Indianapolis Star has the answer in two articles who in USAC could be next for fendered stardom at www.indystar.com. Note that the registration police are out so you may have to register to see the article.

NASCAR Comes to ESPN2 Sunday
ESPN kicks off their coverage of NASCAR early this weekend with the reality TV program “NASCAR Drivers Non-Stop.” The program will follow around Open Wheel JJ Yeley as well as Clint Bowyer and Jeremy Mayfield in the first episode. The new show premieres Sunday, October 29 at 11:00pm/et on ESPN2.

Not So Fast!

2006-10-25T18:49:00.000-05:00

Not So Fast!

Minnesota 3-5 at 2 Ohio State 8-0
Ohio State is ranked No. 1 in the national poles but I have then No. 2 because Louisville had the No. 1 position first. Ohio State will look like they are No. 1 by slapping around a terrible Minnesota team that almost list to North Dakota State last weekend at home.

10 Clemson 7-1 at 25 Virginia Tech 5-2
This will be a good test to see if Clemson is for real. I think they are. The Tigers by at least 7.

11 Notre Dame 6-1 at Navy 5-2
This looks like a blowout but Navy is no slouch. ND will still win but it will be closer that what the odd makers say.

Oklahoma 5-2 at 19 Missouri 7-1
If Oklahoma is as good as they supposedly are, they will beat a good Tiger team. I think the Sooners will win in a good game.

Georgia 6-2 at 17 Florida 6-1
The Cocktail Party should be rocking this year and the Gators will roll by at least 5.

12 Texas 7-1 at Texas Tech 5-3
Texas will win a tough one on the road and further their quest for the BCS.

8 UTK 6-1 at 24 South Carolina 5-2
The Vols are on a roll and are in the catbird’s seat for the SEC Championship and a BCS birth so heading to South Carolina should be not big deal but Not So Fast. Phil Fulmer aka the Great Pumpkin has a good record against almost everyone but Steve Spurrier. The Ole Ball Coach has had his way with the pumpkin over the year and if South Carolina can get up early in the Vols and stay on top, they can win. I think the Great Pumpkin’s team has the talent to out play the Gamecocks and win in a close one.

The phrase “Not So Fast!” is my tribute to Lee Corso of ESPN. It is not intended to infringe on any copyright laws or trademarks.

Look for my rankings Sunday night.

Gordon Comes Clean on Wind Tunnel/ Better Day for Open Wheelers at Martinsville/ Reid Shopping for a Ride/ Open Wheeler Legend Wins/ Hot Chick Warning

2006-10-22T23:12:00.000-05:00

Gordon Comes Clean on Wind Tunnel

Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain has to be one of the best racing programs on TV. It usually brings out the truth from the movers and shakers in the sport. Sunday Jeff Gordon co-hosted the program. Despain put Gordon and Dale Earnhart Jr. together and both of them field phone calls from fans.

“I wine too much… in the heat of the moment,” Gordon admitted to Despain. “I agree that sometimes I wine too much.”

He also took on NASCAR and their development of the Car of Tomorrow.

“I don’t believe it (COT) symbolized the future of racing,” said Gordon. “I don’t like the way it looks.”

The four time Cup Champ says he likes the safety aspects but there is room for improvement in other areas.

The funniest part of the program came when the folks at WT ran a takeoff on the Guinness Draft in a bottle commercial. SPEED’s F1 commentators poked fun at Gordon’s mustache

and his ability to kiss his girlfriend and then hug another woman next to her. The segment was “brilliant.” That segment and the rest of Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain is scheduled for rebroadcast at 12am and 10am eastern Monday morning.

Better Day for Open Wheelers at Martinsville

Martinsville Speedway was rough on the Open Wheelers in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Saturday. Sunday, the story would change as six of the top thirteen Nextel Cup finishers today were Open Wheelers.

Jeff Gordon was off to a good start as he led several laps.

Early in the race it was Open Wheeler vs Open Wheeler as Ryan Newman got into Casey Mears.

Ken Schrader and Dale Jarrett were victims of this accident caused by rookie David Ragan.

Schrader was running in the top ten at the time.

After he got out of his car he helped the track crew with cleanup. No he did not throw the bar.

Casey Mears would go around again when David Gilliland hit him from behind. Mears would recover from two spins, none of his own making, to finish 6th. Jimmy Johnson won the race.

Martinsville Cup Results
1. (48 Jimmie Johnson)
4. 20 Tony Stewart
5. 24 Jeff Gordon
6. 42 Casey Mears
7. 9 Kasey Kahne
12. 99 Carl Edwards
13. 12 Ryan Newman
31. 18 JJ Yeley
33. 22 Dave Blaney
37. 7 Robby Gordon
41. 21 Ken Schrader

Reid Shopping for a Ride

Krista Voda reported on The Speed Report Sunday night that Boston Reid was in the Cup garage in Martinsville talking to several owners about running for them in 2007. Reid told SPEED that he would be interested in racing in any of NASCAR’s top three series. The Speen Report is scheduled for rebroadcast 9am eastern Monday morning.

Open Wheeler Legend Wins
One of the biggest contributors to Open Wheel racing, Paul Newman won his class at the SCCA race at Lime Rock Park today.

Hot Chick Warning

Phoenix International Raceway hit the male demographic on the head

when they cast this lovely lady in their latest national ad.

The television ad promotes ticket sales for the NASCAR weekend at PIR.

All images courtesy of NBC, SPEED and NASCAR Images.

Open Wheel Racing Innovator Passes Away/ Not a Good Day for Open Wheelers at M’ville

2006-10-22T01:01:00.000-05:00

Open Wheel Racing Innovator Passes Away

Ted Johnson changed the course of sprint car racing in the United States and the world. Johnson founded the World of Outlaws in 1978. The former china salesman set out to make his series the best and his drivers stars.

He assembled a group of drivers to tour nationally.

Over the years the series grew and found a partner in TNN.

Johnson’s World of Outlaws at one point became one of the most popular forms of racing in the United States.

The series toured the best tracks in the United States and even convinced

Bristol Motor Speedway to cover it’s hallowed high banks with dirt.

Not everyone agreed with Ted Johnson but everyone could admit that he was a pioneer.

Several years ago I had scheduled a meeting with an IRL official. He didn’t know me from Adam but he knew that my last name was Johnson and that I was from a racing family. He gave me the royal treatment with a personal tour of the IMS facilities. Then he asked how my father, Ted Johnson, was doing. “Ted Johnson is not my father,” I said. “Oh,” said the IRL official. I might have not accidentally got in the door that day if it wasn’t for that mistake.

Ted Johnson wielded a lot of power. He created an empire. He was a promoter and pioneer. His leadership and contributions to the sport of Sprint Car racing will not be forgotten.

Not a Good Day for Open Wheelers at M’ville

There was not a lot of positives to report for Open Wheelers at the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race at Martinsville.

The most positive thing I can say is that Krista Voda did look smokin in that black leather jacket in SPEED’s prerace show.

Now on to the bad news. Young Cameron Dodson went around for the first time Saturday when an impatient Brendan Gaughan hit the sprint driver sending both spinning.

Erin Crocker went around after being tapped from behind.

A multi-car pileup began when someone got into Erin Crocker and it was on. The accident also took out Cameron Dodson.

The final Open Wheeler spin cycle featured USAC veteran Mike Bliss was turned around when Rick Crawford got into Denny Hamlin. Hamlin then got into Bliss. Jack Sprague won the race. Terry Cook was the highest finishing Open Wheeler at 17th.

Open Wheeler Truck Results Martinsville
1. (60 Jack Sprague)
17. 10 Terry Cook
18. 17 David Reutiman
21. 21 Bobby East
22. 16 Mike Bliss
26. 98 Erin Crocker
30. 63 Cameron Dodson

All images courtesy of World of Outlaws, TNN, CBS Cable, SPEED and NASCAR Images.

My Top 25 for Oct. 22, 2006

2006-10-22T00:51:00.000-05:00

My Top 25 for Oct. 22, 2006
1. Louisville 7-0 Beat Syracuse, Cincinnatti, Kansas State, Miami, MTSU and Kentucky.
2. Ohio State 8-0 Beat Indiana, Michigan State, Bowling Green, Iowa, Penn State, Cincinatti, Texas and Northern Illinois.
3. West Virginia 7-0 Beat U Conn, Syracuse, Mississippi State, East Carolina, Eastern Washington, Maryland and Marshall.
4. Michigan 8-0 Beat Iowa, Penn State, Michigan State, Minnesota, Wisconsin, held off Vanderbilt and beat Notre Dame and Central Michigan.
5. USC 6-0 Beat Arizona State, Washington, Washington State, Arizona, Nebraska and Arkansas.
6. Boise State 8-0 Beat Idaho, Louisiana Tech, Utah, Hawaii, Oregon State and Wyoming.
7. Rutgers 7-0 Beat Pittsburgh, Navy, South Florida, Illinois, Ohio and Howard.
8. UTK 6-1 Beat Alabama, Georgia, Memphis, Air Force, Marshall and Cal but lost to Florida.
9. Arkansas 6-1 Beat Ole Miss, Auburn and Alabama. Lost to USC.
10. Clemson 7-1 Hammered Georgia Tech. Beat Temple, Wake Forrest, Louisiana Tech, North Carolina and Florida State.
11. Notre Dame 6-1 Beat UCLA, Stanford, Purdue and Michigan State. Lost to Michigan after beating Penn State and Georgia Tech.
12. Texas 7-1 Lost to Ohio State but beat Nebraska, Baylor, Oklahoma, Rice, and Iowa State.
13. Auburn 7-1 Lost to Arkansas. Beat Tulane, Florida, South Carolina, LSU, Washington State and Mississippi State.
14. Tulsa 6-1 Beat Memphis, East Carolina, Southern Miss and Navy.
15. Cal 7-1 Beat Washington in OT Beat Washington State, Oregon, Oregon State, Arizona State, Minnesota and Portland State but lost to UTK.
16. Texas A&M 7-1 Beat Oklahoma State, Missouri, Kansas, Louisiana Tech and Louisiana Lafayette but lost to Texas Tech.
17. Florida 6-1 Lost to Auburn. Beat LSU, Alabama, Kentucky, Central Florida, Southern Miss and UTK.
18. Wisconsin 7-1 Lost to Michigan but beat Purdue, Minnesota, Northwestern, Indiana, Western Illinois and San Deigo State.
19. Missouri 7-1 Lost to Texas A&M, Beat Kansas State, Texas Tech, Colorado, Ohio, New Mexico and Ole Miss.
20. Boston College 6-1 Lost to NC State. Beat Florida State Virginia, Maine, BYU and narrowly edged Clemson.
21. Wake Forrest 6-1 Lost to Clemson. Beat NC State, Ole Miss, U Conn and Duke.
22. LSU 6-2 Lost to Florida and Auburn but beat Fresno State, Kentucky, Mississippi State, Arizona, Tulane and Louisiana Lafayette.
23. Georgia Tech 5-2 Lost to Clemson and Notre Dame and beat Maryland, Virginia Tech and Virginia.
24. South Carolina 5-2 Beat Vanderbilt, Kentucky and FAU. Lost to Auburn.
25. Virginia Tech 5-2 Lost to Boston College and Georgia Tech. Beat Southern Mississippi, Cincinatti, Duke, North Carolina and Northeastern.

Knocking on the Door
26. Maryland 5-2 Beat NC State, Virginia and FIU. Almost upset Georgia Tech.
27. Georgia 6-2 Lost to Vanderbilt and UTK. Beat Mississippi State, Ole Miss, Colorado, UAB, South Carolina and Western Kentucky.
28. Oklahoma 5-2 Lost to Texas. Beat Colorado, Iowa State and MTSU.
29. Oregon 5-2 Lost to Washington State and Cal. Beat UCLA, Arizona State, Oklahoma, Fresno State and Stanford.
30. Arkansas State 5-2 Beat North Texas, Memphis, Louisiana Monroe, Army and FIU. Lost to SMU and Oklahoma State.
31. Hawaii 5-2 Beat New Mexico State, Fresno State, Nevada and Eastern Illinois. Lost to Boise State.
32. Brigham Young 5-2 Beat UNLV, San Deigo State, TCU and Utah State.
33. Pittsburgh 6-2 Lost to Rutgers. Beat Central Florida, Syracuse, Toledo and the Citadel.
34. Navy 5-2 Lost to Rutgers and Tulsa. Beat Air Force, U Mass and U Conn.
35. Kent State 4-2 Beat Toledo, Temple, Akron and Bowling Green.
36. TCU 4-2 Dropped to Utah and BYU. Beat Army, Texas Tech, UC-Davis and Baylor.
37. South Florida 5-2 (Sunday game vs Cincinnatti) Beat North Carolina, U Conn, Central Florida and FIU. Lost to Kansas.
38. Louisiana Layfayette 4-2 Beat FAU, Houston, Eastern Michigan and NC A&T.
39. Western Michigan 5-2 Lost to Ohio. Beat Ball State, Northern Illinois and Temple.
40. Nebraska 6-2 Lost to Texas. Beat Kansas State, Iowa State, Kansas and Troy.
41. San Jose State 4-2 Lost to Nevada. Beat Utah State, San Deigo State and Cal Poly.
42. Kent State 5-2 Beat Toledo and Temple.
43. Alabama 5-3 Lost to UTK, Lost to Florida and Arkansas. Beat Ole Miss, Duke, Vanderbilt, Hawaii and Louisiana Monroe.
44. Southern Miss 4-3 Beat Houston, Central Florida and NC State but lost to Tulsa, Florida and Virginia Tech.
45. Iowa 5-3 Lost to Michigan, Indiana and Ohio State. Beat Purdue, Illinois, Iowa State, Syracuse and Montana.
46. Houston 5-3 Lost to Southern Mississippi and Louisiana Lafayette. Barely lost to Miami. Beat UTEP, Oklahoma State, Tulane and Grambling.
47. Washington State 4-3 Lost to Cal and USC. Beat Stanford and Oregon State
48. Arizona State 4-3 Lost to USC, Oregon and Cal but beat Stanford, Colorado and Nevada.
49. Penn State 5-3 Beat Illinois, Minnesota and Northwestern. Lost to Ohio State and Michigan.
50. Texas Tech 5-3 Lost to Colorado and Missouri. Beat Iowa State, Texas A&M and SE Louisiana

World of Outlaws Family Remembers Founder Ted Johnson

2006-10-21T14:29:00.000-05:00

World of Outlaws Family Remembers Founder Ted Johnson
By Chris Dolack, WoO VP Public Relations

Ted Johnson and the World of Outlaws. It's pretty hard to say one without at least thinking of the other. That's as much a tribute to the man as it is the racing series he created.
Johnson dedicated his life to sprint car racing, taking the sport to heights not previously imagined. He assembled the greatest collection of sprint car drivers in the world and helped them enjoy careers entertaining fans across the United States and around the world. Through the World of Outlaws, Johnson has impacted thousands of sprint car racers and created national heroes out of the best of the best during the past 30 years.

On Friday night in Texas, Johnson, 72, finally lost his hard-fought battle with cancer.
Born on Feb. 5, 1934, in Beloit, Wis., Johnson developed a passion for motor sports early in his childhood as he watched his father race motorcycles.

Johnson, who briefly drove a midget before settling into a career as a china salesman, never could shake the racing bug and in 1978 he unveiled the World of Outlaws, a collection of the biggest names in sprint car racing that traveled around the country trying to swipe purses from local competitors. The series drew huge crowds, attracted national television audiences and major sponsorship all while competing nearly 100 times a year with Johnson calling the shots every step of the way.

He continued to operate the series until selling it in 2004 to DIRT MotorSports. Even then Johnson found himself involved with the World of Outlaws as an advisor and confidant to those now making decisions.

"Ted Johnson gave all he had to make the World of Outlaws the premier dirt racing series in the world," DIRT MotorSports President and CEO Tom Deery said. "It's up to us as fans and competitors to continue to carry on his legacy. It's not something we take lightly, which is why on Sunday at the World of Outlaws banquet in Las Vegas we will introduce the Ted Johnson Award in recognition of an outstanding contribution to sprint car racing."

Carlton Reimers, who is married to Johnson's daughter, Lesa, has been a World of Outlaws official for more than 15 years, including his current role as Series Director. He spoke of Johnson's love for the sport and its fans.

"It's not possible to think of Ted Johnson and not think of the World of Outlaws and sprint car racing," Reimers said. "He dedicated a tremendous amount of time, energy and resolve to the sport, but above all else Ted was sprint car racing's biggest fan. He loved the sport and those associated with it. Our family wishes to express its heartfelt thanks for all the kind thoughts and prayers we have received. The racing community has truly lost one of its friends."

Steve Kinser, a 20-time champion with the World of Outlaws, raced with Johnson from the series' inaugural event nearly 30 years ago in Texas.

"Ted and I had been together since 1978 when we ran the first race down at Devil's Bowl," Kinser said. "We've been through a lot of stuff together. I started with him with the World of Outlaws when he had a dream of taking a sanctioning body and making it national, which he did. He had a lot of good times of doing it and a lot of rough times, but overall he enjoyed it. He enjoyed getting to the races and being around he racers and the race fans. He did what he enjoyed and did a good job with the organization. We did a lot of traveling together. I supported him for a lot of years and he supported me. We've always been good friends and we had a lot of good times over the years. I've been talking to him about three or four times a day lately and I'm going to miss him.

"Probably the most fun we had was when we started the organization, running up and down the road in a duallie pickup. It was some of the harder times, but it was still some of the most fun. We had a lot of memorable times together, especially when we first started up dealing with Lanny Edwards at Devil's Bowl and Earl Baltes at Eldora, and some of the earlier guys me and him, Lee Osborne, Bobby Allen, Rick Ferkel and all of us. We had a great time driving around. We had arguments, but we had a lot of fun. Me and Ted and a lot of guys over the years that ran this thing had a lot of good times that will never be forgotten."

Reaction from many of those whose lives were impacted by Johnson came quickly.

"TJ and I have been good friends since the mid-'70s," said long-time promoter John Padjen of Silver Dollar Speedway in Chico, Calif. "We talked every day, even yesterday. I have lost a great friend with his passing. Ted certainly brought sprint car racing where it is today. He will be greatly missed. Rest in peace TJ."

"He did more for sprint car racing than anybody ever did for racing," said Rick Ferkel, one of the original Outlaws. "Before the World of Outlaws started, he would actually pay some of us to come to a racetrack and he'd just be in the stands watching. Then he decided to be a promoter and he did it right. We pulled into Shreveport and he had the cops escort us to the hotel. The cops pulled up behind us and we thought we were getting a ticket and instead they escorted us. That's the way Ted was. He did it right. Ted just loved the racers. He started the World of Outlaws because he loved racing. He would have been a multimillionaire if he didn't give so much to the racers. He was probably one of the sport's biggest fans."

"Ted had a vision," said DIRT MotorSports VP Race Operations Shane Carson, who earned a victory in the inaugural World of Outlaws season. "We had races running everywhere and he got everybody together to put sprint car racing on the map. It's a sad day."

"Ted was the man who made the racing series I used to sit in the stands as a kid and watch, wanting to be one of those guys they considered an Outlaw," said Donny Schatz, who is closing in on the first World of Outlaws championship of his career. "From the day I came out here in 1997, he made you earn your spot. He made you earn his respect, and I think we earned it. He disappeared out of the picture for a couple of years [after selling the series] and I got to know him a little better after he came back. Sometimes when you mix racing and friendship in life it can be a sticky situation, but I got to know him very well since he stepped back from the World of Outlaws and became a consultant for the series. It allowed me to know him a little bit better and to understand why he did the things he did. There is no replacement for him. There is absolutely nobody who can be as big a fan as he was, as big a dictator and put on the shows that he put on. He's probably the biggest asset sprint car racing ever had. Without him it would have never reached the level it did."

"He is a big influence on my racing," said Danny Lasoski, the 2001 World of Outlaws champion. "He was the one who talked me into taking a chance and doing this for a living way back when I was building bullets (for the U.S. Army). I owe that guy a debt of gratitude that I don't think I can repay. I hope I have the desire to love the sport when I'm 70 like he did. He's going to be dearly missed and my heart goes out to his family."

"I think Ted meant something different to everybody," said Daryn Pittman, the winner on Friday night at Manzanita Speedway. "The bottom line is, Ted formed the World of Outlaws and basically has given a whole lot of people with an ability to drive a sprint car a very good living. He's given a lot people chances. He built a big enough business that will hopefully allow people to keep making a living. Obviously he loved the sport and had a passion for it."

"Ted built the World of Outlaws to be what it is today," said driver Craig Dollansky. "He was great for the sport of sprint car racing and racing as a whole. It's a sad day for auto racing."

Johnson is survived by his wife, Stacy, as well as his son Rick, his daughter, Lori, his daughter, Lesa, and three grandsons. Services are still being determined.

The staff at Open Wheeler sends our condolences to all of Ted's family and friends.

Reid Looking for 2007 Ride/ USAC Ford Focus Driver Aims for First Truck Start

2006-10-20T12:39:00.000-05:00

Reid Looking for 2007 Ride
Boston Reid is looking for a ride for 2007. The 2002 USAC National Sprint Car Series Rookie of the Year announced on his website http://www.bostonreid.com/ that he is no longer the driver of the No. 25 Woodward Racing NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series entry.

“I regret to inform everyone that I will no longer be the driver of the No. 25 Woodard Racing Dodge in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series,” said Reid in a statement on his website. “I appreciate everything the employees at Woodard Racing have done for me during the 2006 season, and regret that I will not be able to finish the remainder of the year there. I want to thank all of my fans for their continued support and let everyone know that I am working hard to find a new home in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck or Busch Series for the 2007 season.”

Boston Reid finished 14th three times in this season at Kentucky, Mansfield and Nashville. His best start was 18th at Nashville.

USAC Ford Focus Driver Aims for First Truck Start
It is nice to have friends that can give you a heads up if you are asleep at the wheel. TJ, founder of http://www.tjslideways.com/ gave me the heads up on a story that I missed. Thanks TJ.

It looked like Bradley Riethmeyer’s racing career was over. The Texas A&M Senior’s family had no more money to run the aspiring driver. Then he entered the All-American Driver Challenge and won a seat in a midget. This season Riethmeyer finished third in the points and won two USAC Carolina/ Virginia Ford Focus Midget Series. The 22 year old won at Southern National Speedway on April 15th and at Shenandoah Speedway on June 17th. His performance in the USAC Ford Focus Midget Series was good enough to land him in a ride in a NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series entry this weekend at Martinsville. In the first practice session of the day, the Open Wheeler was 38th quick. He was 5th quick in rookie practice and had improved to 19th quick in the final practice session. Both USACRacing.com and NASCAR.com have stories on Riethmeyer. Tune in throughout the weekend for coverage of our Open Wheelers at Martinsville.

http://www.usacracing.com/content/view/6108/100/
http://www.nascar.com/2006/news/headlines/truck/10/19/martinsville.preview/index.html

NCTS Qualifying is set for about 5pm eastern today and the race is set to air at 12:30pm eastern Saturday on SPEED.